Alf: Under red skies
by ninjadragon5
Summary: my story actually takes place before the sitcom TV show, right around the same time as the animated TV show. this story tells of the events that lead to Alf's home planet, melmac, being destroyed. one main cause of it was war.
1. Ch 1: an alien named gordon

Alf: under red skies

Chapter 1: An alien named Gordon

It was the beginning of another day at orbit guard headquarters, a meeting was going to held by the supreme admiral of the orbit guard and it was mandatory that all orbit guard personal be there. All the orbit guard personal was in the great hall sitting in rows of seats. Sergeant staff, the second in command of the orbit guard, started to take roll call. Skip and rick, Gordon two best friends, were sitting in the front row. They soon realized the meeting was about to start and Gordon had no shown up yet. Rick was getting increasingly worried, but skip remained laid back and calm. Rhonda, who was up on the stage with the sergeant, soon noticed Gordon was still missing too and she too began to get worried, she know what the serge would do to Gordon if he was ever late.

"Where's Gordon? He's going to be late and the serge…" rick started to say.

"Relax ricko, don't get your fur all in a knot, he'll be here on time, he always does." Skip soon said.

Meanwhile, in a rural suburban neighborhood named east velcro just outside the city in an oddly shaped orange painted house.

"Gordon! Gordon Shumway! Get your lazy butt out of bed, you going to be late!"

Gordon could hear his mom calling from his room, but he choose to ignore it, he just didn't want to get out of bed, he was having one of those morning.

His mom soon stomped up the stairs to his room and stormed in slamming the door open and said "I'm not calling all you again, out of bed now mister!"

Gordon sluggishly crawled out from under the covers of his bed and looked at his alarm clock "don't worry mom, I still got…..5 minutes!" Gordon said in surprise as he grabbed his alarm clock.

Gordon quickly tried to get out bed, but fell out of his bed trying to do so. Gordon's mom just rolled her eyes and turned to leave his room.

Meanwhile, back at orbit guard headquarters, serge continued to take roll call, he was getting closer to calling out Gordon's name.

"I sure hope Gordon gets here on time." Rhonda said to herself while continuing to check off the list of names being called. The serge heard her and just let out a soft evil chuckle and then continued with roll call.

Meanwhile, back at Gordon's house…

Gordon quickly rummaged through his wardrobe trying to find his orbit guard outfit, throwing his cloths everywhere. Finally, he found his outfit, quickly put it on and rushed downstairs. When he got downstairs, his family was at the table having breakfast, his mom Flo, his dad Bob, his younger brother Curtis and his baby sister Augie. Gordon didn't have time to sit down for breakfast, so he just quickly rushed towards the door.

Then his mom said "Gordon, aren't you forgetting something?"

Then Gordon turned around and said "huh?...oh yeah."

He quickly grabbed some food from the table and then proceeded to leave.

"That is not what I meant, Gordon…"his mom said.

Gordon rolled his eyes, but turned back around to give mom a quick kiss on the cheek. Then just when he was about to leave again, he dad spoke out "son, did you fix the breaks on the car like I asked?"

Gordon stopped his in tracks and said "breaks? ummm…..no, but don't worry, I'll coast lightly."

"and don't forget to pick up the laundry while you're out." Gordon's mom said again.

"alright, mom." Gordon said while rushing towards the door.

After that he was finally able to get out the door. Of course, what he told his dad was a lie about driving lightly; he would have to drive like a mad melmacian in order to get to the orbit guard headquarters on time. He quickly started up his hover car and speeded down his street on to the highway, weaving in and out of passing cars as he went. He soon saw a traffic jam up head, so he pressed the break paddle to slow down, but the car would not stop.

"note to self, fix the breaks!" Gordon said to himself

Not be able to stop, he had to think fast to avoid the cars, he quickly turned his car to the right, turning it sideways and rode along the barrier of the highway missing the blockade of cars completely. Once he was pass the traffic jam, he got his car properly back on the highway, but he was not out the woods yet, he still had to race like crazy if he was going to make it on time. The orbit guard headquarters soon came into view and he speeded towards the front entrance, but he still couldn't stop, so he ended up crashing through the hedge and barrier surrounding the building and was flying towards the side of the building, he knew what going to come next and braced himself for impact.

Meanwhile, inside the orbit guard headquarters, the roll call list finally got down to Gordon's name and the serge soon shouted his name.

"SHUMWAY!"

CRASH

Not a second later, as soon as the serge shouted his name out, his hover car crashed through the wall of the great hall, nearly scaring the hell out the serge and putting shocked faces on the rest of the crowd.

"See, I told you he would make it." Skip said to rick still laid back as before.

"Shumway, what the hell do you think you're doing?! Look at what you did to my building!" serge pointed and shouted at Gordon.

"Hey, ease up, I made it on time didn't I?" Gordon said back.

The serge just growled at him.

Gordon soon noticed that Rhonda was staring at him, and soon said to her "guess I really know how to make an entrance."

"Right sure." Rhonda said sarcastically, but she smiled at him anyway.

"Watch yourself, Shumway! You're playing with death! Now get down here and clean up this mess, or you'll be scrumming toilets for a month!" the serge shouted at Gordon again.

"Is that a suggestion or an order, sir?" Gordon said again as he started to climb down from his car.

The serge let out a nasty growl at Gordon again.

Gordon flinched a bit and said "I'll take that as an order."

So Gordon reluctantly started cleaning up the debris on the floor. Then the supreme admiral appeared out from the door on the right and talked on to the stage, of course eyeing the huge mess that laid out before him. The serge quickly turned around and saw the admiral coming.

"Orbit guards! Ten' hut!" the serge shouted.

All the orbit guard personal stood up from their seats and saluted in the presence of the admiral.

"Presenting the supreme admiral Logan." The serge said again.

"Sergeant Staff, may I ask why there is a huge hole in the wall and a car through it?" admiral Logan said looking at the serge with stern eyes.

"It's private Shumway's fault! He's to blame!" the serge shouted while pointing at Gordon.

"Regardless, it's your responsibility to train all these cadets to their best, so it would do good to keep them all in line." Admiral Logan said.

The serge just growled again, the admiral always did put part of the blame on him whenever one of the cadets messed up, especially when it came to Gordon.

Then the admiral turned his attention towards the crowd, who all sat back down in their seats and then the admiral began to speak.

"Orbit guards, the reason for this meeting is that I'm planning a new mission and I need new recruits to train to become orbit guard pilots. Anyone that wishes to volunteer may please step forward."

Once the serge heard that he gave off an evil grin and so shouted "Shumway! Front and center!"

"Yes, sir!" Gordon said appearing in front the serge.

"I know private Shumway would like to volunteer." The serge said to the admiral with a sinister smile.

Admiral Logan turned and look at Gordon with a raised eyebrow "hmm…good to see a young cadet so ambitious."

"Yeah, wait….what just happened?" Gordon said realized he just volunteered for something he didn't want to do.

Rhonda did notice what the serge had done and she thought it was kind of dirty trick to pull on Gordon.

Admiral Logan then turned back towards the crowd and said "anyone else?"

A few more orbit guard candidates did volunteer, even though they all knew becoming a pilot is a very risky job. After that, the admiral spoke again "very well, I'm grateful for those that have volunteered, you will serve you planet well. All your training will start immediately."

With that, admiral Logan turned away and started to walk off the stage again, but just as he was about to leave, Gordon followed him and asked "uhh…sir, may I ask what kind of mission a volunteered for?"

"One that you may risk your very life for." The admiral said with his back still facing Gordon.

Gordon gulped a bit and said "uhh…no thanks, everyone in my family bruises easily."

Gordon quickly turned around and tried to leave, but was soon stopped as he bumped into the serge.

The serge loomed over him and said with the evil smile still on his face "oh no you don't, you're not going anywhere."

"Sergeant Staff will be supervising your special training." the admiral said before leaving the stage and out the door of the great hall.

Sergeant staff just gave out an evil snicker while Gordon gave the expression of "oh crap."

"I look forward to it." Gordon said in dismay.

The reason why trying to become an orbit guard pilot was risky was because it was probably one of the most dangerous jobs a melmacian could have, aerial combat engagement was not something to taken lightly and not one for the faint of heart, one tiny screw up could send you to an early grave. Plus the tests required to take to pass for a pilot were often very stressful and brutal, only a select few of melmacians got high enough scores to be considered pilots

Sergeant staff escorted Gordon and the rest of the orbit guard candidates to part of the orbit guard building that did the special training for pilots. As Gordon walked on, he soon saw some other candidates that went thought the tests previously and failed and they looked pretty badly beaten up, Gordon started to get really nervous. But surprisingly, once Gordon started on the tests, it did fairly well and passed all tests with the minimal requirements, the bad weather flight test and the high pressure flight test, up until the final test, the flight simulator test. This test simulated if the pilot was in an actual aerial combat situation. The candidates before Gordon went first and they all pasted with fairly high scores to be considered pilots. Finally, it came down to Gordon's turn.

"Alright, Shumway, you're up!" the serge said.

Gordon sighed and processed to climb up into the simulator cockpit. Once he got inside the cockpit, he was like a kid taking an exam that he did not study for. He was utterly lost and confused by how many buttons, dials and switches that were on the console. It was a requirement for all orbit guard cadets to know all the ins and outs of the cockpit in an orbit guard ship once you join the orbit guard, but Gordon seemed to have suddenly forgotten it all. The serge started to stare at him angrily; he would have to think of something quick. He soon saw a big switch to the right of the console; he hoped that was the start button to start up the engine. He flipped the switch, sure enough it was, the simulator cockpit started made the noise as if the ship's engine was starting up. Gordon breathed a small sign of relief, but he was still in trouble. The simulator screens around the cockpit began to come on as the cockpit ascended as if it was taking off from a runway. Gordon grabbed the double joystick steering controls, no really sure of what to do next. Soon enough the targets appeared on the screen, usually crude graphics of enemy ships that flew around the screens to simulate actual combat. Gordon tried his best to shoot at the targets, but turned out his aim was terrible; he barely hit any of the targets while he was taking a lot of hits from the enemy ships. Gordon knew he was doing poorly, and he just wanted the simulation to end so badly. Finally, the simulation ended and the cockpit started to descend again and his score was soon displayed on the screen, 60%. Gordon cinched a bit, he knew he has done badly, but not that bad. You needed a score of 85% or better in order to be considered a pilot, Gordon was far from that. Some the other orbit guard personal still in the simulator area gasped a bit, no one had gotten a score that bad before. Gordon was both relieved and embarrassed, relieved that there was no possible why he would be a pilot now, but embarrassed everyone saw how bad he was, especially with Rhonda, who had been watching him too. Gordon always did have the hots for her and tried to think of ways to impress her, but that she saw how awful he was as a pilot, she might think less of him. Gordon somberly climbed down from the simulator cockpit, knowing he was going to get a lot of wrath from the serge.

"What the hell was that?! Pathetic! I expected a lot better from you then that!" he serge shouted.

"Sorry, sir." Gordon just said while trying not to look up at him.

"You can forget about being a pilot, matter of fact you'll be lucky to be kept on maintenance crew!" the serge shouted again.

"Yes, sir." Gordon simply said.

After that, Gordon just walked away with his head hung low. Rhonda looked back at him as he walked away feeling sorry for him.

All of a sudden, the alarm sounded throughout the orbit guard headquarters, any melmacian knew what that meant; enemy aircraft have been spotted in the area.

"Orbit guard pilots! Suit up, and get to the runway!" the serge shouted to the new recruits.

"Yes, sir!" they all said, saluted and then ran off.

Soon all the orbit guard pilots suited up and gathered out on the runway to get a quick briefing from the orbit guard captain Cantfayl on the situation. Meanwhile, the maintenance crew was called out to give a quick check up on all the ships to make sure they were ready for flight.

"Orbit guard pilots, Larson's squadron has been spotted over the dire straits and is heading this way. No doubt he probably has another diabolical plan to take over melmac; our mission is to intercept his ships before they get to the headquarters. Now move out and good luck men!" said the captain.

"Yes, sir!" all the orbit guard pilots said and started to run to their ships.

Meanwhile, Gordon was doing final prepping and cleaning on one of the ships, then he saw Rhonda coming out on to the runway and coming towards him. He really did not want to see her after the simulator test embarrassment.

"Rhonda!" Gordon said

Thinking quickly, he quickly grabbed the pilot helmet sitting the cockpit seat of the ship and put it on, the least he could try to do was redeem himself a little bit in her eyes by at least pretending to be a pilot. He casually leaded back resting one hand of the ship trying to look cool.

Rhonda soon approached and said "hi Gordon, sorry to hear the serge crewed you out at the flight simulator test."

"Ah, don't worry about it, the serge let me off easy later on. He might consider me a pilot after all." Gordon said.

"Right, sure." Rhonda said folding her arms and being skeptical on what Gordon had said.

"Well, he did." Gordon said realized his pretending was not going over so well.

"Wait, you're not serious about going up there are you?" Rhonda said.

"Ah, they might keep as a backup pilot in case one of then gets sick or something." Gordon said again.

Before the two could say anything more, the captain came up to them and said "Fulkerson! What are you doing? Stop wasting time, were moving out!"

At first Gordon was a bit confused, but then he soon realized the captain must have mistaken him for someone else because he was wearing a helmet.

"Wait, I'm not…"Gordon started to say.

But before Gordon could say anything more, the captain grabbed by the collar of his uniform, dragged him and threw him to the cockpit of the ship. "No excuses!" said the captain.

"But I'm not Fulkerson!" Gordon tried to say, but it was too late, the captain already walked off and was in his ship.

Gordon really had no choice now; he had to play the part of the other pilot. Rhonda couldn't really do anything either, too late to stop the captain now; she just shook her head and said to herself "oh Gordon, what have you got yourself into now." She soon had to clear the runway and the ships were ready to take off.

The captain's ship took off first towards the sky and then the rest of the orbit guard fleet soon followed; soon it began Gordon's turn to take off.

"Okay, I can do this, it's just like the flight simulator, how hard can it be." Gordon said.

He remembered the big switch on the right being the start button, so he switched that and soon enough the engine start to rave up. Then Gordon tried his best to remember how to take off, He grabbed the double joystick controls and slowly started to push it forward, the shipped started to roll down the runway. Then when the ship reached the end of the runway, he pulled the joysticks up and back and the ship lifted itself off the runway. He take off was a little shaky, but he did it, he was pleased with himself he at least got this far. He then caught up with the rest of the orbit guard fleet; he figured he would be okay on just winging it, as long as he didn't have to shot at anything.

Not far off, a huge sleek looking black ship slowly started to appear out of the clouds along with a small fleet of fighter ships following behind. Inside the huge ship's bridge stood the most loathed and feared enemy of melmac, Larson petty. He stood at the head of the bridge while his midget assistant was at the helm and driving the ship forward.

"Sir, were approaching orbit guard airspace." said his assistant

"Good, tell all the squadron fighters to prepare for engagement, no doubt we will run into some orbit guard ships." said Larson.

"Yes sir. All fighters prepare for enemy engagement." said his assistant over the ships intercom.

After that, all the fighter ships started to fly a little bit a head of Larson's ship.

"This time for sure I will wipe out all of the orbit guard and that stinking admiral Logan for kicking me out of the orbit guard and take my rightful place as admiral." Larson said with an evil smile.

Meanwhile, up ahead, the orbit guard squadron was racing through the clouds, making their way to Larson's last known location. They soon spotted Larson's ship and his fighter squadron through the clouds. Gordon soon saw them too and was now realizing he had bitten off more than he could crew, no doubt they going to fight and he knew nothing about aerial combat.

"Dear mom, tell everyone goodbye for me, tell Curtis he can have my cats of all worlds poster. Oh yeah, P.S. tell dad I won't be able to fix the breaks." Gordon said to himself as if he was making out his will just before his death.

Then the captain soon spoke over the intercom "alright listen up, I'll go after Larson's ship while the rest of you take down his squadron fighters, remember be prepared for anything."

Gordon gulped a bit; he was so not ready for this.

Once the ships got closer to Larson's fleet, the captain soon yelled over the intercom again "engage!"

And with that all the ships accept for the captain's speeded forward, of course Gordon was a bit hesitant, the captain soon spotted this.

"Fulkerson! Stop lagging behind, engage the enemy!" the captain shouted over Gordon's intercom

Gordon had no choice; he had to go through with this. So he speeded off with the other ships.

Meanwhile, back on Larson's ship.

"So they like to make the first move, very well then. All fighters attack!" Larson shouted over his ship's intercom.

Sure enough Larson's squadron fighters speeded forward; soon the two fleets meet and engaged in the fury of combat. Gordon was soon lost in the chaos; all he could do to avoid getting hit was to keep dodging gunfire and ships. This was far different from what he experienced in the flight simulator, turns out the real thing was a lot scarier. No way was he going be able to shoot at anything; he could not pick out clear target in this mess

Meanwhile, the captain was engaging with Larson's ship, they were dueling in a constant game of chicken, and charging at each other while firing off shots and then dodging each other at the last moment, only to swing their ships back around and do it again. Neither one of them doing much damaged to each other's ship and neither one of them backing down.

Finally, Gordon spotted a clear target, one of Larson's fighter ships had zoomed right in front of him and was too preoccupied pursuing another orbit guard ship to notice him. Gordon figured with the fighter ship so close there was no way he could possibly miss, so he fired off a few shots anyway. But as soon as he did, the fighter ship made a sharp turn to the left and he ended up shooting the other orbit guard ship instead. This was the one instant he was glad he had bad aim; he only managed to clip one of the other ship's wings. Soon the other obit guard ship dodged out of the way too.

"Hey, just who's side are you on, buddy?!" Gordon heard the other pilot yell over his intercom.

Gordon hid his face with his hand in embarrassment. Soon enough the squadron fighter he tried to shoot at earlier was pursuing him now and was firing shots at him. Gordon had to think of something fast to lose this guy, unfortunately, he was not the greatest at flying either, so that was going to be near impossible. Suddenly the fighter ship managed to clip one the wings of his ship, it took quite a bit of damage and was giving off a lot of smoke, he had to think of something quick or he was done for. Then suddenly Gordon stirred his ship straight up, not really caring where he was going, he just wanted to get rid of the fighter on his tail. What he didn't realize was he was heading straight for the captain's and Larson's ship engaging in battle, until it was too late. The captain and Larson's ships were just about to hit each other again when suddenly Gordon's ship came speeding past between them. Gordon was able to dodge the shots the two ships firing at each other, but the other fighter ship was not so lucky and was soon caught in the crossfire and exploded.

"Are you out of your mind, pilot?! I almost hit you!" the captain yelled over the intercom to Gordon's ship.

"What the hell just happened?! Who was that?!" Larson shouted.

"I don't know, but I think that orbit guard pilot just made us shoot one of our own." His assistant said in a shy voice.

Larson growled and then shouted over the ship's intercom "fighters three and four get after that damaged ship!"

Immediately two ships brought away from the battle and became pursuing Gordon's ship. Great, Gordon had two fighters tailing him now, there was no way he could dodge both of them, he was in a panic now and in a desperate move he swung back around to make another close pass over the captain's ship hoping the captain would help him out. Unbeknown to him, he got so close this time that the smoke he was giving off from his damaged wing fogged up the captain's glass to his cockpit to the point he couldn't see.

"You're out of line, pilot! That stupid move you just did fogged up my windows, I'm flying blind now!" shouted the captain over Gordon's intercom.

"Dam." Gordon said to himself.

While inside Larson's ship, he soon saw what had just happened and soon said with an evil grin

"Wait, this may work in my favor. Start to execute plan alpha."

"Yes, sir." said his assistant.

The assistant helmsman quickly swung the ship around until facing the rear of the captain's ship. Once he did that, he fired a huge harpoon gun attached at the bottom the ship; once the harpoon was fired it embedded itself in the side of the captain's ship. Then Larson's ship started to drag along the captain's ship by the cable attached to the harpoon.

"Now I got you right where I want you." Larson said with an evil chuckle.

The captain knew something bad was going on, but he still could see exactly what it was happening. He could still see though the radar on his ship, but there was no possible way the judge the distance and direction of Larson's ship without seeing it with his own eyes.

"Orbit guards! I think I'm in trouble, indeed of assistant!" the captain said.

But his plea for help was futile, all the other orbit guard pilots were too busy fighting off Larson's fighter ship squadron, including Gordon who still being pursued by two fighter ships, because of his ship's damaged wing, it became harder for him to keep the ship stabilized.

Larson's ship was dragging the captain's ship towards another small group of his fighters lying in wait in cloud cover not far off.

Meanwhile, back at the orbit guard headquarters, sergeant staff and the rest of central command were surveying the battle and they could see things were not going well. The serge became furious.

"I don't know who that pilot is, but he is jeopardizing the mission!" the serge shouted.

Rhonda was standing by the serge and saw what was happening too, she knew it was Gordon who was in that ship.

"Gordon is in trouble, I got to do something." said Rhonda.

She knew what she needed to do, but rather do it unnoticed; she knew the serge would protest. While the serge was to occupied watching the battle on the display screens, she quietly snuck away from the central control room, and then ran to put on a pilot uniform and then ran to the hanger while there was a spare orbit guard ship lying in wait. She started up the ship, steered it towards the runway and then took off. She raced through the sky towards the battle; she had to help out the captain first, and then go help Gordon. She soon saw the captain's ship being dragged along with Larson's ship by a harpoon, she quickly fired off some shots from her ship, and she was able to get an accurate enough shot to cut the cable that had attached the two ships together. She soon saw the captain's cockpit was covered up be soot, she had to figure out a way to wash it away. One of the storage compartments in the ship was carrying extra fuel; she figured that was the best option she had to clean the captain's ship. She quickly positioned her ship directly above the captain's ship and opened the storage compartment to dump the fuel; the fuel splashed on the captain's ship and soon washed away the soot on the captain's windshield.

Soon the captain could see out of his cockpit again and saw the pilot that helped him. He did not recognize the ship; it was not part of the original fleet he took off with.

"Whoever you are, thank you." said the captain.

Rhonda had just enough fuel left to help Gordon out and then return to orbit guard headquarters.

Meanwhile, back on Larson's ship, Larson soon saw the ship that helped free the captain and shouted "now who the hell is that?!"

"I don't know, sir. That ship just appeared out of nowhere." said his assistant.

"Well, after it!" Larson yelled.

The helmsman did as he was told and steered the ship to go after the mystery pilot. Rhonda knew Larson's ship was following her now, but right now the more important thing was she had to find Gordon. She soon spotted Gordon's damaged ship being pursuing by the two fighter ships, she raced up behind them and started to fire off shots which in turn made the two fighter ships break away from their pursuit. Then Rhonda flew up right next to Gordon's ship, Gordon soon noticed he was not be followed by the two fighter ships anymore and soon spotted the ship to his right, he got a brief glimpse of who was inside the cockpit, the pilot looked to be female, but Gordon did not recognize the pilot because she was wearing a helmet. He saw the unknown pilot wink at him from the cockpit.

Rhonda soon spoke over Gordon's intercom "stay calm and follow me."

Gordon did recognize that voice, but at the moment he couldn't quite pick it out.

Gordon did as he was told and followed his mystery pilot. Rhonda soon swung back around and started helping out the other orbit guard pilots by taking down Larson's fighter ships.

"Just follow everything I do." Rhonda said again to Gordon.

Which he did, he followed her every move and only fired off shots from his ship when she did, surprisingly by doing this his aim got a lot better, at least he was able to hit the enemy ships this time. But it was nothing compared the phantom pilot he was following, the pilot was able take down Larson's fighter ships within just a few shots, whoever ever the pilot was, was really good. Rhonda and Gordon started taking down the fighters ships one by one.

"Sir, those two ships are taking down our squadron fighters!" said the helmsman assistant.

"Dam! Hurry up and get after them!" Larson shouted.

The helmsman steered to ship to pursue the two ships, once Rhonda saw the Larson was following her again, she turned her ship around again and raced off, Gordon soon followed her. Larson was soon following close behind and firing off shots from his own ship.

"Great, now we got Larson following us." said Gordon.

"We want that; get his attention to buy the captain more time." Rhonda said over Gordon's intercom.

Meanwhile, back at orbit guard headquarters, the serge and central command were stilling watching the scene unfold.

"Sir, an unidentified aircraft just entered the battle zone." said one the of the central command officers to the serge.

"Is it Larson's?!" said the serge

"No, looks to be an orbit guard ship, but it is not part of the squadron that left with the captain." said the central command officer.

"Who is it then?!" the serge shouted.

"Don't know, but whoever it is, is on our side, that pilot just helped free the captain and is now assisting that damaged ship." said the central command officer.

"I don't care what that pilot is doing! Whoever that person is an unauthorized pilot in restricted orbit guard airspace!" the serge shouted.

Meanwhile, back in the battle zone, Larson was still pursuing the two ships. Rhonda soon noticed the fuel to her ship was low, if she did not break away now, she might not be able to return to headquarters. She had no choice, as quick as a flash she broke away from the chase and disappeared through the clouds, she hoped what she did would be enough to save Gordon and the mission.

"Sir, one the ships just broke away." said the assistant helmsman.

"Never mind that one; we'll go after it later, right now take down the one in front of us." Larson said.

"Yes sir." said the assistant helmsman.

Gordon soon noticed that his mystery pilot was no longer with him. Great, he was alone again with Larson chasing after him and had no idea what to do. He figured this was the end for him now.

Suddenly he heard an explosion from behind him and he looked back to see what it was, he could see Larson's ship was on fire, his ship must of taken a hit, but who had done it? Then he soon saw the captain's ship appear right behind Larson's, the captain must of snuck up behind him and Larson was too occupied in chasing after Gordon he didn't know he was there, the plan had actually worked. After firing off a few more shots at Larson, the captain flew up beside Gordon and then took off again, Gordon got the hint he should follow the captain, so he did and the captain lead him away from Larson's burning ship.

Meanwhile. Inside Larson's ship…

"Sir, the ship as taken on massive damage, its power is down to 30%! If we take another hit like that, we'll crash!" the assistant helmsman said.

Larson slammed his fist on the ship's console and shouted "dam! Curse you orbit guard! Fine, tell the squadron fighters to make a full retreat!"

Soon after, Larson's squadron fighters broke away from the battle and followed Larson's burning ship, eventually disappearing into the clouds.

"Captain, Larson and his squadron are retreating, should we continuing pursuing them?" said one the orbit guard pilots to the captain.

"No, I think he got the message, let's head home. Besides I got a bone to pick with a certain pilot." said the captain.

Gordon didn't like the sound of that.

Soon the captain and the other guard pilots turned around and headed back to orbit guard headquarters. Soon they all landed safely back on the runway, Gordon was the last to land and his landing was very shaky because of his ship's damaged wing. Gordon knew all eyes were on him now. After his ship landed and parked next to the rest of the ships, the captain and the rest of the orbit guard started to crowd around Gordon's ship, all of them were curious to just who exactly was in that ship. Soon the serge stepped out on the runway too and joined the others, ready to give this reckless pilot an ear full on his rage. Soon Gordon opened the cockpit hatch and ready to climb out of the ship, but of course he was a bit hesitant as everyone was staring at him like a flock of vultures ready to tear him apart. But he knew he had to face the music sooner or later, so he slowly took off his helmet.

"Gordon!" both the captain and the serge shouted at once in surprise.

All the other orbit guard pilots gasped in surprise too.

"Shumway, what the hell do you think you're doing in that ship?! Get down here now!" shouted the serge.

Gordon did as he was told and climb down out the ship, ready to receive whatever punishment the serge had in store for him.

"That has got to be the most irresponsible thing…" the captain started to say.

"Stand down, captain. I'll take it from here." said the serge interrupting the captain. The captain then stood aside.

"As the captain said, that has got to be the most irresponsible thing you have done! You almost cost us the mission!" the serge shouted at Gordon.

Gordon just hung his head low, he had no words to back him up, he knew what he had done was wrong.

"I've had it with you, this is the last straw! I have a good mind to kick you out of the orbit guard right now!" the serge continued to shout at Gordon.

Rhonda soon appeared on the runway and pushed her way through the crowd, she knew Gordon was getting a load of wrath from the serge and would most likely demise him from the orbit guard. She had to say something in order to save Gordon from being kicked out.

Rhonda soon ran up to the serge and said "sir, may I please speak."

"What is it private Rhonda?" the serge said, his attention turned on her.

"Sir, I saw the whole thing myself too, while Gordon did screw up a bit, he did help distract Larson long enough for the captain to take him down.' Rhonda said.

"Even so, that does not excuse him from his actions!" the serge shouted again.

"But sir, in a way he did save the mission." Rhonda soon said again.

"Not without nearly costing the life of the captain first! So regardless of what you say, he has to be punished!" the serge shouted again.

"That's enough, sergeant." A voice soon spoke out.

Everyone turned and saw it was Admiral Logan who spoke as he walked on to the runway. Everyone stood up straight and saluted as he walked passed them; he soon stopped in front of Gordon and looked down on him with a stern face.

"Sir, this cadet…" the serge started to say.

"I know, I heard everything." said the admiral interrupting the serge.

The serge then kept his mouth shut and stood aside to let the admiral speak.

For a few moments, the admiral just continued to stare at Gordon, Gordon tried to best to continue to look at the admiral with a straight face. He dare not look down, that was considered an insult to the admiral, and he really didn't want to add that to his long list of crimes.

Finally the admiral spoke out "impersonating a pilot, damaging orbit guard property and endangering the lives of the other orbit guard pilots, all of these are considered crimes against the orbit guard and would result in dismal…"

Gordon sighed; he knew what was coming next.

"But, your actions in the end did help assistant the captain in taking down Larson and his squadron and for that you should be least awarded for your efforts." The admiral soon spoke again.

Everyone, including Gordon, was awestruck at what the admiral had said

"But sir…!" the serge started to speak.

"No more objections, sergeant, in the end he did help save the mission. Even though he is not a pilot, he still stood firm in the face of battle." The admiral said to the serge.

Gordon blushed a little bit, he knew that was not the whole truth, but no way was he going argue that with the admiral.

Then the admiral turned his attention back to Gordon and said "but take note, cadet, ever do something like this again and I will be forced to demise you."

"Yes sir" Gordon simply said confirming her understood.

Sometime later, a small ceremony was held in the great hall of orbit guard headquarters to give Gordon his reward for his efforts. Admiral Logan, Captain Cantfayl and sergeant staff along with Rhonda was there, along with of the entire orbit guard personal. Even his family ended up attending the ceremony.

The captain stepped towards Gordon with a medal in his hand and soon said "for helping the orbit guard fleet and saving melmac from the evil clutches of Larson petty I present to you the melmac medal of merit."

After the captain finished speaking, he pinned the medal on Gordon's chest.

Then Rhonda soon walked up towards and said "congrats, Gordon."

"Thanks, but really half this medal goes to that phantom pilot that helped me, I wonder who she really was?" said Gordon

"Well, I will give you a hint." Rhonda said and then winked at him.

Gordon was puzzled as to what she meant. Rhonda winked at him again, he still didn't get it.

"Is something wrong with your eye?" Gordon soon said.

"Nevermind." Rhonda replied.

Rhonda figured she would tell him who she really was someday, but now was not the right time.

"Oh, by the way, thanks for sticking up for me." said Gordon.

"But it was really the admiral that stuck up for you in the end." said Rhonda.

"Yeah, I wonder how he knew." said Gordon again.

"I told him what happened. I knew you would be devastated if you were ever kicked out the orbit guard." said Rhonda.

"You did? Well, thanks again, I guess I owe you one." said Gordon.

"Hey, why don't we get out of here and go for a catsunday?" said Rhonda

"Sounds like a good idea to me, but first I gotta pick up the laundry." said Gordon.

Gordon and Rhonda soon left the stage together, but before Gordon could leave the stage, it was soon stopped by the serge.

"You're lucky this time, Gordon, but I'll be keeping an eye on you." said the serge pointing a finger in his face.

After the serge said that, he again moved aside to let Gordon pass. Gordon just breathed a heavy sigh and proceeded to walk off the stage.

Gordon soon rejoined up with Rhonda and they joined arms together as they both walked out of the great hall.


	2. Ch 2: Trust and betrayal

Alf: under red skies

Chapter 2: Trust and Betrayal

Eventually, Gordon's praise for saving the flight mission against Larson petty had soon surpassed, within a few days Gordon was back to being is regular self and the whole situation was mostly forgotten about. Gordon had to admit he did like the praise while it lasted, but soon he liked being back to his regular self as well. Though, not everyone was happy about what he had done, it created some animosity among the other orbit guard pilots, especially among the higher ranking pilots, those that have trained for years to get where they are only to be out beat by someone who has never been trained a day in his life to save the day.

One day, at orbit guard headquarters, Gordon, Rick and Skip were in the hanger bay doing daily maintenance and checkups on all the orbit guard ships along with the rest of the maintenance crew. Gordon often hated doing maintenance work, it was often tedious and dirty work, but it was the only thing he was really qualified for in the orbit guard academy.

Gordon was working on a ship when he soon saw three tall and muscular melmacians enter the hanger bay, it was Jed and his two comrades, they were among the highest ranking pilots in the orbit guard fleet and often liked to abuse their status by bullying lower ranking members. All three of them soon walked towards Gordon, he rolled his eyes and then stood up firmly, ready for whatever insults they had to dish out this time.

"Well, if it isn't the bottom of the scum bucket in the melmacian gene pool." Jed said as he continued to walk towards Gordon.

"What do you want now, Jed?" Gordon said still standing firm. He tried to look as if he was not intimidated by him in the slightest, even though he was a bit scared of him, Jed was a lot taller and bigger then he was.

"I heard about the stunt you pulled a few days ago, did you really think someone as stupid as you could ever pass as a pilot?" Jed said angrily.

"Say what you want, Jed. I already got a medal for it." Gordon said.

"A medal you didn't deserve" Jed pointed a finger at Gordon.

"You think you're a tough guy, ready to play with the big boys now?" Jed said as he started to shove Gordon in the shoulder.

Then suddenly Skip stepped up besides Gordon to try to intervene "hey, chill out, man, he did save the day." He said.

"Oh, you want some of this too?' said one of Jed's comrades as he approached Skip.

"Now there is no need for fur to start to fly." Skip said as he started to get nervous.

Rick on the other hand, just stood by and watched, too chicken to stand up to Jed and the others.

"Just leave us alone, we never done anything to you." Gordon said again to Jed.

"Doesn't matter, just you being here is irritating because you're a screw up, you were born a screw up, you will die a screw up and so you will forever be a screw up!" Jed said while continuing to shove Gordon.

Soon Jed pushed Gordon so hard he fell down and landed on a bucket of water that was sitting on the floor.

Suddenly, just went Jed was just about to make another go at Gordon, another tall and muscular melmacian stepped in between the two.

"That's enough, Jed." The stranger melmacian said.

Jed stopped in his tracks and his eyes went a bit wide, even though the other melmacian was about the same height and muscular as Jed, he seemed a bit intimidated by him.

For a few moments, the two just stared at each other, then Jed finally said "fine, there not worth it anyway."

Then Jed walked away and soon said "come on, boys."

Eventually, Jed's two comrades turned away as well and followed him.

"You better stop sticking up for these weaklings, Cojack and you better watch yourself, scum-way." Jed finally said as he and he comrades walked out of the hanger.

Then the stranger melmacian turned around to face Gordon, leaned down and offered a Gordon a hand to help him back up.

"Are you okay?" the stranger soon said.

Gordon took the stranger's hand and said as he started to get up "umm…yeah, thanks, but aren't you a pilot too?"

Has Gordon would have of guessed by the patches on his orbit guard uniform.

"Yes, that I am, but you nothing to fear from me, I feel it is unnecessary to bully lower ranking personal." said the stranger.

This stranger was new to Gordon, he had never seen him at the orbit guard headquarters before, and he was quite tall and nicely toned out for a melmacian, towering over Gordon by a good foot or two. His fur was a darker shade of brown from Gordon's and he had long kind of messy bangs on top on his head that fell into his eyes. Besides the orbit guard uniform it was wearing, he wore green baggy cargo pants with pockets on them and a pair of combat boots, one the few melmacians that actually wore shoes. One thing, Gordon noticed the most about him is that his right eye was not normal, it was slightly clouded over and had a large scar running over it.

"Who are you?" Gordon said.

"The name is Cojack." said the stranger while offering he hand out to Gordon again, proposing a friendly handshake.

At first Gordon was nervous to shake hands with this stranger, but eventually he accepted it anyway "umm…Gordon, Gordon Shumway."

After they finished shaking hands, Cojack said "oh trust me, I know who you are."

"You do?" said Gordon.

"Sure, just about everyone knows you name now, you created quite a stir here a few days ago." said Cojack.

"Yeah, I guess I did." said Gordon down casting his head a bit.

"Who is your new friend, Gordon?" skip said as both he and rick walked over to Gordon.

"Name is Cojack." said Cojack as he turned and shook hand with both Skip and Rick.

"Thanks for getting out that mess, if you haven't come at that time, who knows what Jed and his bubbies would had done." said Rick.

"It was no trouble at all, besides, like I said, I do believe in pilots that bully other lower ranking members." said Cojack.

"What they pick on Gordon for anyway?" said Skip.

"Most of the time they do it just so they can feel superior, but in Gordon's case, they are most likely jealousy of him because he rewarded for his efforts and they didn't." said Cojack.

"But I don't think I really deserve it, maybe Jed was right." Gordon said down casted his head.

"Of course you do, do did save the mission, I would know, I watched the whole thing myself." Cojack said.

Gordon perked his head back up once he said that.

"Matter of fact, I was one the pilots in the captain's fleet that left that day. I knew right away there was a different pilot in that ship, just by the way you were flying." Cojack said.

"So, if knew you the whole time, why didn't you do anything?" Gordon said.

"Mostly because I was too busy taking Larson's ships down myself and to see how you do on your own. Half way through the battle was going to help you, but it seemed another pilot had beaten me to it." Cojack said.

Then Gordon thoughts went back to the mystery pilot that helped him that day. No one ever found out who that pilot was, and Gordon still pondered who that pilot could really be.

"Anyway, don't look down on yourself so much; to me I think you got potential to be a pilot." Cojack said.

"Pff. Yeah right, if were watching me the whole time then you know what really went down. I seemed the screw things up more than help and I couldn't hit a target if my life depended on it." Gordon said kind in a sad tone.

"Even so, you were still able to fly a ship fairly well, that is pretty impressive for someone who never had any formal training." Cojack said.

"Yeah, I guess you right." Gordon said while sketching the back on his neck.

"The point is, don't put yourself down, and don't let what Jed and his bubbies say get to you. You have more potential than you think." Cojack said.

"And if Jed and his bubbies start bothering you again, don't hesitate to come to me for help." Cojack said again while offering he hand out again.

"Okay, thanks." Gordon shook his hand again in agreement.

After that, Cojack turned to leave and walked out of the hanger.

"See you around, kid." Cojack lastly said as he soon walked through the hanger bay door.

Gordon still wondered who that guy really was, but he was happy he had found a new friend, especially one that was a pilot.

Meanwhile, in a dark swampy region of Melmac laid a tall structure of steel and iron, it had areas of rust and residue from the moisture in the environment around it, along with various vine plants that tried to crawl their way to the top of the structure. On top of the structure had a construct that looked like in the shape on melmacian head with triangle shaped eyes and a gaping maw with large sharp spikes that resembled teeth. It looked just as dark and menacing as the person residing in it. It was the main fortress base of Larson petty.

Inside the main control room of the base, Larson was pacing back and forth angrily while his assistant was sitting in a chair next the control console.

"How?! How is this possible one idiot pilot could bring be down?! I had the fleet captain right in my grasp!" Larson said and he continued to pace back and forth.

"It seems they had a plan of their own and we fell for it." said his assistant.

Larson growled and then shouted "that's it! No more games, no more wasting time, I need a plan they will wipe out the orbit guard for good, one that will actually work!"

Larson then slammed one of his fists into a wall in the room and actually managed to punch a hole through it.

"Your temper, sir." said his assistant.

"I need more men, more ships and more weapons and I need them now!" Larson said to assistant.

"We can always steal some ships and weaponry from the orbit guard and capture pilots, brainwash them to our side." His assistant suggested.

"No, that would take too long; I need a massive army right away. Bad enough it will take weeks to repair my ship." Larson said.

Then Larson continued to pace back and forth trying to think of a plan, but he was running up blank, his assistant then turned the chair to face the console, he didn't have any ideas either.

Suddenly Larson stopped in his tracks, an idea soon formed in his head and a sinister smile spread across his face. "and I know just where to get it."

"Sir?" his assistant said as turned back around to face his leader.

Before his assistant could say anymore, Larson spoke out "get my frigate ship ready for deep space flight."

"Deep space, sir? Where are we planning on going?" said his assistant.

"You find out soon enough. Now get going!" Larson said.

"Yes sir!" said his assistant and immediately got out of his seat and rushed out of the control room and down the hall to the hanger bay.

In the hanger bay of the base laid Larson's frigate class ship, it was much smaller than his destroyer ship and was mostly used just for traveling around the planet and into deep space. Larson mostly only used his destroyer ship, but since that ship was out of commission at the moment, he figured this was the next best thing. Larson soon boarded the ship while is assistant was finishing up the preparations. His assistant, of course, sat in the driver seat next the console in the cockpit and Larson sat in a bigger seat just behind his assistant. First, they had to get the word from central control in his base that their where no obit guard ships in the area and that they were clear from launch. Once given the all clear, the hanger bay doors opened and the ship rolled out on the runway and soon lifted off into the air and heading straight high into the planet's atmosphere.

Once the ship was clear of the planet's atmosphere and out into the vastness of space, Larson soon spoke "set course for planet Panthera."

His assistant turned his head in surprise "but sir, that is enemy territory."

"I know." Larson just simply said.

Despite his assistant's concerns, he set the course coordinates on the console for the planet Panthera anyway. Once the coordinates were set, he shifted the ship to into warp speed; soon enough within a blink of an eye the ship raced off and vanished into the void of space. The planet Panthera was several parsecs away from Melmac and would take a quite bit of time to get there even in warp speed. Eventually, the ship had reached its destination and it dropped out of warp speed and the planet soon came into view. Panthera was a cold and foreboding looking planet, it orbited around its native star just a little farther away than Melmac, so the climate was colder and harsher, most of the land masses were cold, rocky and bare with little vegetation on them and most of the oceans were frozen over, but still was able to support life.

As the ship started to approach the planet, Larson's assistant soon spoke out "sir, forgive me, but this where the Felidae reside, if they spot us, they will shoot up down before we get close to the planet."

"I'm well aware of that. Just keep quiet; I'll handle things from here. Keep moving the ship forward." said Larson.

Despite his assistant's disapproval, he went ahead and did it anyway and driving the ship closer to the planet. Soon enough as the ship was about enter the planet's orbit; a voice came over the comm link to the ship. "Unidentified vassal, state your origin and business here or we will fire upon you on site."

Larson stood up from his seat so he could speak over the comm link "this is Admiral Larson petty from the planet Melmac, I wish to speak with your emperor, I mean no harm upon you and I have come unarmed. I only wish to deliver a message and perhaps discuss business with you."

After Larson spoke there were several minutes of silence, his assistant was just about sweating balls on what his leader had just said.

Finally a voice spoke over the comm link again. "Request accepted, you have permission to land."

Larson assistant breathed a sigh of relief and Larson sat back down in his seat kind of smudgishly and said "see? I know how to handle these kinds of things."

Once Larson's ship entered the planet's atmosphere, the ship flew towards the capital city of their planet where the emperor would be. Even their cities looked dark and unfriendly, made up mostly of dark tall towers and spires that rose miles high into the sky, most of the city of covered in a thick fog in the air which made visibility in the city kind of hard. Soon the ship approached the tallest tower of them all in the city, it towered over the other structures by several miles and it was so tall that the top of it could not be seen as it was covered up by the thick cloudy fog; it was the main citadel that the emperor of the felidae resided. Larson's assistant was kind of in awe at how big and tall the tower was, it made any of the cities on Melmac look like a child's playground.

Larson's ship soon docked at a docking station just outside the citadel. As soon as the docking arms clammed down on ship to hold it in place, Larson and his assistant were free to unboard their ship. As soon as they unboarded the ship and walked down the tunnel from the docking station to the citadel, two felidae guards with their spears were already waiting for them at the entrance.

"A warm welcome as always." Larson said sarcastically.

The two guards lead then down several more hallways until they came to the huge double doors that lead to the grand chamber where the emperor's throne room was. The guards soon opened the doors and Larson and his assistant followed right behind them. The emperor's throne room was gigantic with a very high ceiling and thick tall pillars on each side and long narrow windows between the pillars, on the other side of the huge chamber were several steps that up the throne where the emperor himself sat and on each side of the throne were long dark red curtains the draped from the high ceiling almost to the floor with the felidae symbol embossed on them. Despite the grand scale on this chamber, it was very dark and ominous; most of the throne room was made out of a black shiny stone material that was similar to black marble on earth. Very little light came in the chamber even from the windows that looked out to the outside, the only light that seemed to fill the chamber were long strips on neon light that were embedded in the floor that made a narrow path from the huge double doors to the throne and from some neon light strips that were embedded in the back wall behind the throne.

Larson and his assistant started to walk down the narrow path leading to the throne. Larson remained calm and collected, walking with his back straight and his arms behind his back, his assistant however was a bundle a nerves, constantly look left and right and over his shoulder, making the two guards to eye him intently. Soon Larson japed his elbow into his assistant's chest to give him the hint to stop it.

But his assistant had a good reason to be nervous, the felidae were a very intimidating race compared to the melmacians. They were a lot taller than melmacians, they had slender but well-toned out bodies with long limbs, long catlike tails and razor sharp claws. Their legs resembled the anatomy of a cat if it had stood up on its hind legs. their heads had a resemblance to a cat as well, with pointed ears and elongated front fangs in the mouths and piecing yellow pupiless eyes that seemed to glow in low light conditions, but unlike cats, they had very little fur, the only fur they had was tuffs of it on top on their heads and half way down their necks, the rest of their bodies were bare skin, their skins color mostly bared the colors of dark browns, greys or black. Since they were mostly bared skinned, most of them wore thick armor to protect them and their armor just as dark as the skin color. Their armor had thick shoulder and chest plates, armor braces around the fore arms and legs and shin guards around their waist and upper part of the legs. Some wore helmets, some did not, and it all depended on their rank. Their weapons were a little more primitive looking then melmacian weaponry, but still just a lethal. Their weapons resembled long spears, battle axes and swords, but still able to produce beams of light and energy.

Larson and his assistant continued to approach the emperor and stopped just before the steps to lead up to his throne, Larson immediately bowed before him to show respect and then his assistant soon did the same. The emperor just continued to sit in his seat and stared at them with his narrow yellow eyes. Finally, the emperor stood up, he was dressed differently than the guards, the only battle armor he wore was the chest and shoulder plates and gauntlets on his arms, underneath the armor he wore a tunic the draped downed his shoulders and in-between his legs. On his head he wore a helmet with gems and spikes around the top. In one hand he held a long staff with an elaborate cluster of twisted and tangled spikes coming out at the top with an red orb in the center.

Once the felidae emperor stood up, he pointed a long clawed finger at the two melmacians and spoke "why you come here, melmacian. Your kind is not welcome here."

Then the emperor narrowed his eyes and said "have you forgotten the treaty you established with us."

Once Larson and his assistant stood up again, Larson said "no, I have not forgotten the treaty, matter of what that is why I'm here."

"What do you mean, melmacian?" the felidae emperor said.

"I've come to deliver a message, or rather a warning, I'm afraid the melmacians have decided to break the treaty between our races and they are planning an invasion on your home world." Larson said.

The emperor's eyes went wide with shock and shouted "filthy space vermin! How dare you threaten us! We will obliterate every last one of you!"

"How before you jump in any conclusions, we can make a deal to prevent this from ever happening." Larson said.

"What kind of deal?" the emperor said.

"First of all, I do not want this, so I myself and the men under my command have left the orbit guard and created a rebel force of our own to overthrow the orbit guard and the melmacian council. But so far our efforts have been futile, as my resources are limited." Larson said.

"What do you request from us then?" the emperor said angrily as his patience was started to wear thin.

"I request the use of some your soldiers, battles ships and weaponry, your men and technology would be the edge I need to overthrow the melmacian empire." Larson said.

The emperor narrowed his eyes again and remained silent for a few minutes.

Finally, he spoke again "what do we get in return?"

"Once I become new leader of all Melmac, the planet will be open to you again, free to use any of our resources and come and go as you please." Larson said.

The emperor fell silent again and then closed his eyes, as if thinking of what decision to make.

Finally the emperor opened his eyes again and said "very well, we have a deal."

An evil smile spread across Larson's face.

"Under one condition!" the emperor shouted as he raised his long staff and pointed at Larson " I will send commanders along with my soldiers, my soldiers will take commands only from them, not from you and you will return all our ships and weapons to us once the war is over."

Then Larson was silent for a moment but eventually he spoke out "very well, I accept your demands, your majesty." Larson said as he bowed his head again.

"How soon do you need my army?" the emperor said.

"Immediately, the sooner my plan is put into action, the sooner I can stop the invasion." Larson said.

"Then expect an armada of battle ships to come in a few days' time." said the emperor.

"Fine, I will accept that." Larson said.

"If you have nothing further to discuss with me, then be gone with you." The emperor said as he sat back down on his throne.

After that, the two guards escorted Larson and his assistant back out of the emperor's throne room, and back down the hallways that lead to the ship docking station. Larson's assistant was quite rather shocked on what his leader had just done, but choose not to say anything until they were free to talk among themselves. Soon enough, Larson and his assistant were back on their ship, again Larson seat in his seat while his assistant sat in the driver's seat.

"Well, I say they went quite smoothly." Larson said.

His assistant was about to say something, but he was a bit hesitant. Larson soon took notice of this and looked at him angrily.

"If you're going to say something, spill it out now." Larson said.

His assistant so turned to face him and said "sir…. I don't mean to question you, but are you crazy?! You just made a deal with a felidae which have been our enemy for thousands of years, they can't be trusted."

"You heard the emperor himself, he accepted my offer." Larson said.

"And to let them use our resources, they will crimple our planet." His assistant said.

"Ah, but you didn't hear my entire plan, once I rule all over Melmac, I will turn on the felidae and use their own technology against them." Larson said.

Shock and horror soon spread on his assistant's face again at what he a just said.

"Sir, I don't think that is very wise, who knows what they could do to us." His assistant said.

"you see, that's the other thing, once I become leader of all Melmac, whatever is left of the orbit guard will have no choice but to follow me and aid me in turning against the felidae." Larson said.

"But furthermore, you based the deal on a lie? Melmac never had plans on breaking the treaty with them or invading their planet. If they felidae ever figure that out, we'll be the ones in trouble" His assistant said.

"Sometimes you have to do whatever is necessary to win a war. Now, no more questions! You joined my army because you believe my way is right and just from the orbit guard, which means I expect you to follow any of my orders without question! Do you understand me?!" Larson said.

His assistant just down casted his head and said "yes sir."

"Good, now start up the ship; I want off this miserable planet." Larson said.

His assistant did as he was told and started the ship up, once the ship had started up, the docking arms in the station released the ship and it was free to fly off. Larson's ship then flew out over the city, out of the planet's atmosphere and back home to Melmac.

The whole time of the trip back home, Larson's assistant still thought about his leader's plan. He was right it was not his place to question him, the very reason why he stayed with Larson after he was banned from the orbit guard because he was loyal to him, but still even this plan he thought was truly insane.

Back on melmac, things really didn't get much easier for Gordon; he was still often harassed by Jed and his comrades, mostly pulling harmless pranks on him just to get a few laughs. Of course, the sergeant didn't care, matter of fact he encouraged them. He did go to Cojack when these things happened, but Cojack was not always around when he needed him. This melmacian was like a ghost, sometimes here was there and other times he would disappear like never existed in the first place. When Gordon asked around to know if anyone had seen him, no one knew who he was talking about. And to make things worse, if he didn't get enough grief from Jed, he got some from the sergeant as well, making him do the dirtiest and nastiest of jobs at the orbit guard headquarters. Ever since that day he crashed through a wall with his car and posed as a pilot, the serge had been a little bit harder on him. Gordon was thankful for the days when he didn't have to do orbit guard duty.

Meanwhile, all that time Gordon had thought about what Cojack had said, he said he had potential as a pilot, of course Gordon didn't think so, but he couldn't help playing with the idea what if he really did become a pilot? Pilots were the highest ranking members in the orbit guard aside from the captain, the serge and the admiral and they got respect for what they do, didn't have to take any of the bullying from other members. Gordon did like the feeling of praise on the day he saved the mission, for the first in his life he felt like a somebody instead of a nobody. But then he thought back to that aerial battle against Larson petty he was in, that was probably the most terrifying experiences he had ever been through and he was not sure he wanted to go through that again. Still the respect and praise was very tempting, the Shumway family had come a long line of nobodies, most of the family Gordon did know about were middle class workers or farmers, he did hear about his grandfather being in inventor once, but not very good one. He couldn't remember anyone is family line accomplished anything great. This made Gordon depressed because he figured he and his family was following the same line by settling in with being a nobody. So it was then that he decided, he would do it, he would become a pilot and actually accomplish something worth wild in his life. At least would try to become a pilot and even if he failed, at least it would give him better satisfaction that he tried real hard. Gordon knew he could pass the other tests to become a pilot with ease, it was just that flight simulator test that he had trouble with, he figured if just practice more he would get better at it, but he would have to do it in secret because he knew the serge would greatly protest, the serge already thought of him as a waste of fur.

One day, when Gordon was at the orbit guard headquarters, he waited until the late afternoon hours where most of the orbit guard personal had gone home for the day and then he carefully sneaked away from his usual orbit guard duty and sunk into the flight simulator room. He made sure no one was watching him, but unfortunately someone did see him sneak into the room. No one was in the flight simulator at the time which was good; it was the way Gordon wanted it. He figured that if he did this alone without any pressure from the serge or the other pilots staring at him, he would do better. He soon climbed up into the simulator cockpit, this time he remembered how to start up the simulator, and he flipped the big switch on the right on the console and the engine started up, the cockpit ascended again and the simulation started. Gordon tried to remember what he did while he was in that aerial battle with Larson, his flying was a little better, but his aim was still terrible, he still missed a lot of targets and took on a lot of damage from the enemy ships. Soon enough, the simulation was over with and Gordon eagerly awaited his score to appear on the display screen, soon enough it did, 70% appeared on the screen. Gordon breathed a heavy sigh; his score was better, but still nowhere near good enough to be a pilot. As the cockpit descended again and the simulators shut itself down again, Gordon leaned he head down on the console and stared blankly at the floor and let his mind fill with the many mixed thoughts he had.

"What I am doing?" Gordon thought to himself. "I don't anywhere near enough the skills to be a pilot." Maybe the serge and Jed were right, he was worthless, he was pretty much a failure at everything, he figured even if did try hard he would still never get it right. Maybe it was his fate to never become a pilot, to never be good at anything and just accept the fact he would always be a nobody.

Suddenly a voice spoke out "training a bit late, aren't we?"

The voice nearly made Gordon jump out of his fur. At first he thought it was the serge, but once Gordon looked out over the cockpit, it was only Cojack standing at the far side of the room.

"Cojack! Thank Dave it's only you." Gordon said.

Then Gordon thought how in the world he get in here without being noticed or how Gordon didn't notice him at all this whole time, now this new acquaintance of his was really started to weird him out.

"Wait….have been watching me this whole time?' Gordon said.

"Mostly." Cojack said as walked towards the cockpit.

"Why?" Gordon said as he raised an eye brawl.

"I saw you go into the simulator room alone, I was curious has to why, so I followed you in, but when I got in here, you were already starting the simulator, so I figured it was best to wait until you were done." Cojack said.

"Okay, but that's not what I meant, I meant why are you following and watching me all the time, and why did you stick up for me when I was teased by Jed?" Gordon said.

"Simple, like I said, I think you have potential, I think you could be more then you think you are." Cojack said.

"I think your wrong about me." Gordon said down casting his eyes

"I think you do have potential, you just afraid to use it and that you are so filled with self-doubt that you think you will never be good at anything." Cojack said.

"You know nothing about me." Gordon said as he turned away from Cojack.

"That's true, I don't, but I could if you let me, I could help you with your training, help you become that great person you want to be." Cojack said.

Then Gordon turned back towards Cojack and said "you do that for me?"

"Sure, why not? Looks like you could use all the help you could get. First, let's start with your training in the flight simulator." Cojack said.

Then Cojack climbed up into the simulator cockpit himself and sat on the co-pilot seat behind Gordon.

"Go ahead, start it up again, I'll tell you what to do." Cojack said.

Gordon did as he was told and started the simulator again, at first when Gordon started to run through the simulation again, Cojack remained silent. Then finally Cojack said "I see what the problem is, your shots are too random, don't just start shooting at everything you see. You got to make more precise shots and focus on the enemy closest to you."

Gordon did as he was told and sure enough it was actually hitting the targets better and destroying a few targets. Cojack continued to give Gordon more instructions on flying strategies and perfecting his aim. Soon enough the simulation was over again and they both waited for the score to appear on the screen, sure enough it did, 76%. Still not great, but better than he was previously.

"See? You can do better." Cojack said.

"I suppose. But why are you helping me? You're a high ranking pilot too, so shouldn't you be against me?" Gordon said as turned around in his seat to face Cojack.

"Because I have been watching you, not just the time you posed as a pilot or here in the simulator room, but way before that and I have seen you struggle. You want to be good at something, but your self-doubt stops you. Plus you want to impress the girl of yours, am I right?' Cojack said.

Gordon looked at him with a surprised face and said "Rhonda? How did you know about her?"

"I have seen you two together a lot; it's not that hard to figure out." Cojack said.

"Yeah, that is what I wanted, but it's more than just that, I'm just sick and tired of being a nobody." Gordon said.

"Kid, listen to me, you don't have to be great to be somebody, you can be somebody by just being who you are instead of pretending to be what you are not." Cojack said.

"Yeah well, what if being who you are kind of sucks?" Gordon said.

Cojack just sighed and shook his head and then he said "very well, if you feel that this something you need to do, then I won't stop you." Cojack said.

"Thanks and one last thing, don't tell anyone about this, I don't want anyone to know, especially Rhonda. I don't want her to know, not yet anyway." Gordon said.

"Don't worry; your secret is safe with me." Cojack said.

After that, Cojack got out the co-pilot seat and climbed down from the simulator cockpit and soon said "we'll continue your training tomorrow, same time and same place."

"okay." Gordon said as started to climb down the simulator cockpit himself.

Then Gordon suddenly remembered something and spoke again "hey, I forgot to tell you, Jed and his bubbies…"

"I know, I'll handle it." Cojack said as he walked out the door from the simulator room.

Gordon thought it was odd how the melmacian knew so much about him, but he barely knew anything about him. Indeed his new friend was a strange character, but Gordon figured if the guy was really going to help him train to become a pilot, he was not worried about it too much.


	3. Ch 3: nobody to somebody

Alf: under red skies

Ch 3: Nobody to somebody

Over the next several days, Gordon and Cojack did what they had agreed upon, every day when Gordon had orbit guard duty, he would sneak into the flight simulator room and Cojack would meet him there and they would practice on the flight simulator together. With Cojack's training, Gordon slowly, but surely did get better. Because Gordon had to his training in the afterhours in the orbit guard headquarters, he would often arrive home late in the evening. His family soon took notice of his lateness and started to become concerned, but every time his parents asked why he was so late, Gordon said it was nothing to worry about. Soon even Gordon himself was starting to get concerned how much longer he could keep this a secret. He didn't what his parents to know he was training to be a pilot either because he knew how they would worry. He knew they would find out eventually when he would past the flight simulator test, but right now was just not the best time.

One day, during one of his training sessions with Cojack, Gordon soon asked "Cojack how long are we going to keep this up?"

"Until you feel you are ready, why?" Cojack said.

"My parents are starting to get suspicious with me arriving home late." Gordon said.

"Then we will have to start training earlier in the day, I know it's risky, but it will have to be done if you want to keep this secret." Cojack said.

"okay." Gordon said.

"But really, you should tell your family of this, they at least ought to know." Cojack said.

"No, they wouldn't understand and my mom would just worry herself to death and I don't want her to worry." Gordon said.

Cojack let out a sigh again and said "very well, but you shouldn't keep secrets from your own family."

"Someday I will tell them, but not now." Gordon said.

So after that, the next few days Gordon and Cojack did start to train earlier, it was a lot harder for gordon to sneak away without anyone noticing, especially the sergeant, but it had to be done. But it wasn't long before things started to unravel, one day sergeant staff was making his daily run to make sure everyone was doing their duty and not slacking off. Soon his came to the hanger bay where the maintenance crew was doing daily maintenance on the orbit guard ships. The sergeant saw all the crew personal was there expect for one, Gordon Shumway.

"Hey! Any of you know where private Shumway is?!" the serge said furiously.

Rick and skip soon stopped what they were doing and notice Gordon was no longer with them. "We don't know sir; he was with us a few minutes ago." Skip said.

Then the serge turned back around and walked out of the hanger bay furiously, grumbling to himself "that Gordon, I will shave his hide one day."

Meanwhile, Gordon was had already snuck down the hallway and into the flight simulator room waiting to meet up with Cojack. Soon enough, Cojack was walking down the hallway and saw the serge walking angrily towards him, Cojack noticed he had just come from the hanger bay and was not hard to figure out what he was angry about. Cojack quickly ran into the simulator room before he was spotted and Gordon was waiting for him by the doorway.

"Hey, Cojack , what training are we going to start today?" Gordon said immediately.

"Not today, the serge is looking for you. You need to get out of here." Cojack said as he started to push Gordon out of the room.

"What about you?!" Gordon said.

"I'll be fine; the serge won't be looking for me." Cojack said.

After that, Cojack shoved Gordon out the room and closed the door behind him, just in time that the serge spotted him.

"There you are, Gordon! What are you doing away from your duty?!" the serge said as he approached him.

"Ummm….snack break?" Gordon said trying to think of something quick.

"Well, get your scrawny furry ass back in the hanger before a shave your hide!" the serge shouted pointing back towards the hanger.

"Yes sir." Gordon said as he quickly walked away from the serge. As he did so, he breathed a sigh of relief, that was too close for comfort.

Soon Gordon was back in the hanger bay and made his way to where Rick and Skip were.

"Hey gordo, glad your back, the serge was looking for you earlier." Skip said.

"Yeah, and he was really mad too." Rick said.

"I know, we met." Gordon said.

"That's the 7th time you have disappeared on us, you better stop doing that or the serge will have our heads." Skip said.

"I know, sorry about that, guys." Gordon said.

"Where do you go all the time anyway?" Skip said.

Gordon didn't really want to tell them the truth, but he hated keeping secrets from his friends. He soon figured they were going to find out sooner or later, so he figured it was better to tell them and have them figure out for themselves as it might damper their trust. The last thing he wanted was to lose his friends.

Gordon let out a sigh and said "alright, I'll tell you, but not here. Meet me at the diner after were off duty."

Skip and Rick were a bit puzzled by his request, but they agreed upon it anyway. Soon enough, as they all got off duty in the late afternoon hours; they all meet at their favorite diner. They soon all sat down in a booth and ordered some drinks.

After they ordered the drinks, Skip was the first to speak "okay, gordo, go ahead a spill the beans."

"Yeah, what's the big secret all of a sudden?" rick said.

At first Gordon was a bit hesitant to speak, but finally he said "Cojack has been secretly training to become a pilot."

"WHAT?!" they both shouted.

"Shhhh! Not so loud!" Gordon soon said.

Their shout out did make few heads turn from other people in the diner, but they soon went back to what they were doing.

"But Gordon, why? I thought you never wanted to be a pilot." Skip said.

"Yeah, besides remember the mess you made the last time you wanted to be a pilot." Rick said.

"I know, but Cojack is training to be a better pilot. I'm doing this mostly because I'm tired of being pushed around like I'm a nobody." Gordon said.

"But how can you be sure to trust this Cojack guy, we barely know him." Skip said.

"Well, he has been good to me so far; he even saved my ass from the serge today." Gordon said.

"I don't know, he still seems pretty fishy to me." Skip said.

"Gordon, if you're trying to become a pilot that means you got to take all the tests again, including the flight simulator test." Rick said.

"I know, that is what Cojack has been training me on." Gordon said.

"When are you planning on doing it again?" rick said.

"I'm not sure, I hope soon." Gordon said shrugging his shoulders.

"Personally, I think you're crazy, there is no way the serge would ever let you in the fleet." Skip said.

"I at least have to try, if I score good enough on the test he might put me on." Gordon said

"Okay, but don't say I didn't warn you." Skip said.

"Well, whatever it may be, we'll support you all the way." Rick said and then looked towards Skip as if he wanted to say something too.

Skip let out a sigh and said "yeah, I guess we will."

"Thanks guys." Gordon said back

Then Gordon soon spoke again "oh, one last thing, please don't tell Rhonda, I don't want her to know, not yet anyway."

"Why's that?" skip said.

"She might take it the wrong way; I don't want her to think I'm trying to impress her in any way." Gordon said.

"Gordo, if you want Rhonda to like you, keeping secrets from her isn't the best way to go about it." Skip said.

"I know, I'll tell her one day, but in my own way." Gordon said.

After that, Gordon and his friends talked a bit more and finished their drinks and then went home for the night.

00

Now Gordon had to be extra careful when sneaking away to his pilot training with Cojack with the serge eyeing like a hawk most of the time, but since his friends Rick and Skip now knew about it, they would easily cover for him when the serge was around. The next few days went on rather quite smoothly, Gordon would met up with Cojack as usual and their training sessions would go on without interference and Gordon was getting better every time, but like always good things come to an end sometime.

One day, while was sneaking away to the flight simulator room, Jed, a high ranking pilot in the orbit guard spotted him and decided to follow him. Jed saw him go in the flight simulator room and once Gordon was inside, Jed snuck behind the door and opened it quietly just a little bit to hear and see what was going inside. Jed could see Gordon taking to Cojack and the both of them climb into the flight simulator cockpit. Jed continued to watch them as the training session continued.

Meanwhile, in the flight simulator room, Gordon started the simulator just like always, but this time Cojack give very little instruction and just let Gordon run though the test on his own. In truth, Gordon really didn't need instruction this time, the controls finally felt natural to him and was hitting just about every single target. Soon when the simulation ended, his score appeared on the display screen, 95%. Gordon himself was quite surprised about the score he got; he became really proud of himself.

As he and Cojeck climbed down from the cockpit, Cojack soon said "congratulations, I think we are done with the training sessions for now."

"So you really think I'm ready?" Gordon said with a smile.

"Well, that all depends on you, do you think you are ready?" Cojack said.

Gordon took a minute to think, he looked back and the simulator cockpit and the score still displayed on the screen. Then he turned back to Cojack and said "yeah, I do believe I am ready."

"Then you are." Cojack said as he put his hand on Gordon's shoulder.

"See, you never know what you capable of once you put your mind to it." Cojack said again.

"Yeah, I guess, but I really couldn't of done without you. Thanks for helping me." Gordon said.

"No trouble at all." Cojack said. Then him and Gordon both shuck hands as a way to complete they agreement that their training sessions were over.

Meanwhile, back outside the simulator room, Jed over heard the whole thing.

"Why that dirty, backstabbing…" Jed said.

Jed soon ran off before Gordon would come through the door and ran to the orbit guard pilot training room.

In the training room, Jed's two comrades were there harassing younger cadets making give up what money they had and abuse them with the weighting training equipment. Soon enough, Jed rushed into the training room and spoke to his two lackeys.

"Ease up boys, we got bigger problems now, I just overheard Cojack as be secretly training that Gordon scum-way to become a pilot."

"I knew that guy was too goody-goody." said one of Jed's thugs.

"Yes, and we all know the mockery that gordon made of us last time. There is no way I'm flying in the same skies as the screw up." Jed said again.

"So what do we do, boss?" said one of Jed's thugs again.

"Gordon is going to take that flight simulator test tomorrow, we make sure he never passes that test." said Jed.

"What about Cojack?" said one of Jed's thugs again.

"Leave him to me." said Jed.

Then Jed and his two comrades huddled close together and spoke in a whispered conversation as for the other orbit guard personal not to hear them and they made plans on how to sabotage Gordon's efforts on becoming a pilot.

00

The next day, Gordon was feeling quite chipper then he usually does because he knew he was going to take the fight simulator test and pass it this time. In the morning, he actually got up early to report to his orbit guard duty on time, his parents found a bit odd why he was such a happy mood, but choose to think nothing of it. At the orbit guard headquarters, it just happened to be Gordon's lucky day; the serge was again holding training sessions for young cadets that wanted to become pilots.

After the serge took roll call in the great hall, he soon spoke to all the orbit guard personal "alright, I'm holding another pilot training session today for young cadets, if any of you maggots think you got what it takes, say so now!"

Gordon immediately rose hand up and said "count me in, sir!"

Gordon's two friends, Rick and Skip, along with few other cadets gasped as what he said. They were all quite surprised someone like Gordon would openly volunteer for such a thing. Even though, rick and skip knew what Gordon was going to do before hand, they never thought he was seriously about it.

The serge just cocked an eyebrow at him and then said "forget it, Shumway! I don't want another embarrassment like last time!"

"But sir, I'm really ready this time!" Gordon said.

Then the serge just grumbled and rolled his eyes and said "fine! But you better not waste my time!"

So after a few more cadets volunteered, the serge started the training session and Gordon went through all the tests, since he had taken all these tests before, he passed them with ease. Soon enough it came to the flight simulator test again and eventually it came to Gordon's turn again. Even though the other cadets and the serge were eyeing him with more interest now for his odd behavior, he still had the confidence in him; with Cojack's training he knew there was no way he could not pass now. Gordon climbed up in the simulator cockpit and started up the sequence for the simulation to begin, but unbeknownst to Gordon in the shadows were no one could see, one of Jed's comrades was hiding and was holding a small device in his hands. Once the flight simulator started for Gordon, he pushed a button on the device and it sent out a signal straight to the simulator cockpit.

Meanwhile, in the cockpit, Gordon soon noticed something was wrong, the controls on the console were not responding correctly, his shots at the targets were severely delayed so therefore he missed a lot of the targets, his movements were sporadic and he couldn't control which what to turn. His so called perfect flight simulation test was turning into a disaster. All the other cadets who were watching started to laugh at him.

"Shumwaaayyyyyyy…" the serge started to say through grinded teeth.

Then Gordon shouted "sir, it's not me! The controls in this thing are messed up!"

"Get out of that cockpit before a rip every hair off your body!" the serge shouted.

Gordon did as he was told and cut the cockpit engine off which made the simulation end before it could finish. As soon as the simulation ended, Jed's comrade stopped transmitting the signal from the device and snuck away before anyone saw him.

As Gordon climbed down from the cockpit, the serge stomped furiously towards him and shouted "I don't know what of prank you trying to pull, but I'm not laughing!"

"sir, like I say, it was not me, the controls were messing up!" Gordon said.

"Don't make excuses for bad performance!" shouted the serge again.

"I swear to you it was not me! Check the cockpit for yourself that it's messed up!" Gordon said.

Despite the serge's better judgment, he soon said "fine, but you better not be lying to me."

Then the serge climbed up to the cockpit himself and checked the controls, but he could find nothing wrong with them, all the controls were working perfectly fine. Then the serge turned back towards Gordon and "there is nothing wrong with the controls, Shumway."

Gordon's jaw could of fell on the floor in shock. A few of the other orbit guard cadets started laughing again.

Then the serge stepped down from the cockpit and approached Gordon and for a few minutes just loomed over him with the most intense angry case. Gordon said nothing, but honesty he didn't know what to say now; he just wanted to shrivel up and die right now.

Finally, the serge shouted "that's it! You're on toilet duty for a month! Now get out my sight before I pound into the floor!"

Gordon just simply walked away with his head hung down, this was his biggest embarrassment ever, but thankfully Rhonda was not here to see this. He didn't understand, the flight simulator was working for him just fine yesterday and how come it worked for the other cadets, but not him? The more Gordon thought about it, the more he suspected fowl play in this, it was too much of a convenience that the controls would stop working properly just at the time he had to take the test. He decided he had to find Cojack, he would know what to do in a situation like this.

Gordon started running through the halls of the headquarters in search of Cojack, at first he could not find him anywhere, but then finally he spotted him.

"Cojack, I'm so glad I found you!" Gordon said as ran over to Cojack.

Right away Cojack could see something was troubling Gordon, so he soon said "what's the matter, kid?"

"I think someone sabotaged me during the flight simulator test because when I took the test today, the controls would not work for me, yet when the serge checked them out he couldn't find anything wrong with them." Gordon said.

"Mmm…alright, I'll look into this. Thanks for letting me know." Cojack said.

After that, Gordon and Cojack went their separate ways again, Gordon went to the hanger bay where he knew Skip and Rick would be, but avoided being seen by anyone as much as possible after his flight test humiliation. Meanwhile, Cojack started searching the headquarters for any potential suspects that might have sabotaged Gordon, the first place he thought to look what the orbit guard pilot locker room, he knew ever since that day Gordon posed as a pilot, the other pilots had some animosity towards him and would not like the idea of him becoming a pilot. First, Cojack made sure there was no one in the locker room at the time and it was indeed empty, Cojack wanted to search all the pilot's lockers for anything unusual. The first locker he choose to search was Jed's since he was the pilot that disliked Gordon the most. Thankfully, he was an expert at picking locks and carefully picked at the lock until it came open, then Cojack carefully searched Jed's locker, but he found nothing out of the ordinary. Next, he searched one of Jed's comrade's lockers, again at first he couldn't find anything, then at the bottom of the locker he spotted a device that looked odd to him, he took it out and once he did he instantly recognized what it was.

"Clever Jed, but not clever enough." Cojack said to himself.

Then Cojack quickly closed the locker again and locked it and got out of the locker room before any one saw him. Gordon had to know about this straight away, so Cojack went in search for Gordon again. Soon enough Cojack found him in the hanger bay with his two friends.

"Hey, Cojack." Gordon said as he saw him enter the hanger bay.

"Hi ya kid; look I need to talk to you alone." Cojack said.

Rick and skip looked a bit confused, but Gordon just said "its okay guys, I'll be back shortly."

Gordon and Cojack left the hanger bay and went into a more secluded room where no one could hear or see them.

"So did you find anything?" Gordon soon said.

"Yes, I found out what the problem was."Cojack said while holding out a small device in his hands.

Gordon looked at the device in puzzlement and soon said "what is it?"

"It is an EMP transmitter, it sends out an electrometric signal that scrabbles any electronic equipment that comes in contact with it, that is why the controls would not response properly for you." Cojack said.

"But the controls were fine when the serge checked them out." Gordon said.

"That's because since this device is small and creates a more direct signal the effects are only temporary. The thing is, the person holding the device as to be in close range of the object they want to use it on in order for it to work." Cojack said,

"So that means whoever use this had to be in the flight simulator room as I was taking the test?" Gordon said.

"Correct, and I have a pretty good idea who. It was either Jed or of his comrades as I found this in one of their lockers." Cojack said.

Gordon gave off an angry took and down casted his head "dam, I knew had to be him."

"So I suggest you get this sorted out before it's too late" Cojack said as he handed the device to Gordon.

"Why are you giving this to me?" Gordon asked.

"Because I'm not the one that as to get his name cleared." Cojack said

Then Gordon nodded in agreement and took the device from Cojack.

"Good luck." Cojack then said.

After that, Gordon and Cojack went out of the room and went their separate ways again. Gordon went back to the hanger bay to let his friends know what was going on. Once he entered the hanger bay, he spoke to Rick and Skip "guys, I got to take care of something, can you cover for me?"

"Sure, like we always do." Skip said

"Thanks guys." Gordon said and then ran out the hanger bay towards the sergeant's office room.

As he got closer to the serge's office, he began to slow his pace trying to think of what to say to the serge. He was so nervous that it felt like a massive flock of butterflies were flying around like crazy in his stomachs, he really didn't want to see the serge ever again after his huge embarrassment, but he had to do it to prove he was not lying. Soon his came to the serge's office door, he let a sigh and then reluctantly knocked on the door.

"Come in." he heard the serge say from inside and he opened the door.

As soon as the serge saw who was coming in, he growled under his breath and soon said "Gordon, you better have a good explanation for this."

"Uhh…I do sir. I want to explain about the incident in the flight simulator earlier today." Gordon said nervously while approaching the serge's desk.

"You better, I don't tolerate idiots in my orbit guard force." The serge said.

Then Gordon put on a brave face and put the device he had with him down on the serge's desk and then said "that's the reason why the controls would not work for me when I took the test."

Then the serge had the look of surprise on his face, he too instantly knew what the device what and the serge soon spoke again "where did you get this?"

Gordon didn't think of that part, he had to think up a lie and think it up quick; he certainly was not going to tell him Cojack was the one who found it by was snooping around in the pilots locker room.

"I found it on the floor in the flight simulator room." Gordon said.

"Mmm…I see and I suppose you already know what it is and what it does." The serge said.

"Yes sir." Gordon immediately said.

"And what makes you think that this device is the reason for failure on taking the test?" the serge said.

"Well, think about it, sir. Why would the controls not work for me, but did for the other cadets and when you checked them you couldn't find anything wrong with them?" Gordon said.

"even if this was true, someone had to be in the room at the time and it had to be a pilot because only they have access to a device like this." The serge said folding his arms.

"That is what I'm trying say, sir. I think an orbit guard pilot sabotaged me while I was taking the test." Gordon said.

"That's a pretty serious accusation, Shumway and I suppose you don't know who it is either?" the serge said.

"No, I do, I think it is orbit guard pilot Jed." Gordon said.

"HA! One of the highest ranking pilots in the orbit guard fleet?" the serge said while leaning back his office chair.

"Yes sir, you know as well as I do he hates me." Gordon said.

"And for good reason. Do you have any other proof besides this device and your word of mouth?" the serge said.

Then Gordon down casted his head and said "no sir, I don't."

"Then you don't enough evidence to support your claim. Now get out my office before I throw you out." The serge said as he started to turn away from Gordon.

Then Gordon started to get angry, despite a piece of good evidence, the serge still did not believe him. Then Gordon slammed his hands down on the serge's desk and said "alright, you want proof?! How about this, let me take the test again, just you and me and no one else!"

The serge quickly turned back around and stood up from his seat with his hands leaning on his desk "watch yourself, boy! You're asking for as serious ass kicking."

Gordon was just about ready to faint, he couldn't believe what he just did, he actually talked back to the serge, but he soon spoke up again anyway "let me take the test again and that will prove I'm not lying."

The serge then sat back in his chair, let out a deep sigh and rubbed the temple of his forehead with his fingers to give it some thought "alright, but if you screw up this time, your outta here!"

After that, the serge escorted Gordon back the flight simulator room, they got a few looks from other orbit guard personal as the walk passed, wondering if the serge was finally going to give Gordon the boot out of headquarters. Soon they both entered the flight simulator room again, the serge just stood near the simulator cockpit while Gordon climbed up into the cockpit again and just like he did before he flipped the switch to start the simulator sequence, he still remembered everything Cojack taught him, so this time was going to be no different. Once the simulation started up again, Gordon immediately started shooting down the targets and maneuvering with ease, the serge eyes started to go wide with surprise on how well he was going. While Gordon was going through the simulation, it started to draw a crowd, the other orbit guard personal started to take notice too on how good Gordon was doing. Soon enough everyone in the headquarters started to pile in the room.

Back at the hanger bay where Rick and Skip were suddenly an orbit guardsman ran into the hanger bay and shouted "hey everyone! That Gordon Shumway is taking the fight simulator test again!"

Then everyone started to run out the hanger bay, Rick and Skip were full of shock and soon joined the crowed that left the hanger bay. Soon enough Rick and Skip made their way into the fight simulator room with everyone else, they pushed and squeezed their way through the crowd to get a better view to see what had been said was true and once as got to the front of the crowd, they saw it was true, Gordon was doing the test again and doing well.

Soon enough, the simulation ended and everyone eagerly awaited the score to appear on the screen and sure enough it did, 95%. Everyone in the room including Rick and Skip gasped with surprise, as for the serge, his lower jaw almost literally hit the floor when he saw the score Gordon got. There was no way anyone could fake or rig getting a good score on the flight simulator test, the serge made sure of that, so it had to be legit.

Gordon sat back in the cockpit seat with his arms folded behind his head with a smug mile on his face and he soon said "see, I told what I said was true."

After a few minutes of silence, the crowd started to cheer for Gordon, no one had actually showed the serge up by doing well on the flight simulator test.

Then the serge turned towards the crowd and shouted "alright everyone, break it up! Get back to your duties!"

Soon after the crowd quickly dispersed, Gordon soon climbed down from the cockpit and both Rick and Skip approached him to congratulate him.

"Congrats grodo, you finally passed the test!" skip said.

"Yeah, I didn't think you had it in you." Rick said.

"Well, like a friend of mine once said, you never know until you try" Gordon said.

Then the serge soon approached Gordon, both Rick and Skip backed away, the serge soon just stood there looking down at Gordon with a stern angry expression on his face and Gordon's smile he still had on his face quickly faded away, wondering if the serge was going to yell at him again, for what this time he didn't know.

Finally the serge leaned down a bit to made eye level contact with Gordon said "okay, so you have proven you got some skills, but there is still one more test you got to pass, my test."

An evil grin spread across the serge's face. Gordon didn't like the sound of that.

"You're going in the orbit guard fleet race tomorrow. We'll see how well you really do inside a cockpit." The serge said. Gordon gulped at that thought.

Then the serge turned and walked away from Gordon. Just then Gordon remembered something.

"Hey, what about my case?!" Gordon said to the serge

The serge stopped, but did not turn back towards Gordon "you may have proven that the device was used, but I still don't believe you it was Jed, I'll investigate this personally."

Then the serge continued to walk on and left the flight simulator room. Gordon was kind of disappointed the serge still didn't fully believe him, but he was happy he at least got his named cleared.

"Device? Jed? What's going on, Gordo?" said skip.

"I'll explain everything later" Gordon said.

00

Later that day, Jed was in the pilot locker room sulking, he had got the news of Gordon passing the fight simulator test and he not too happy about. Suddenly one is comrades ran in the locker room and shouted "boss, did you hear!? That Shumway passed the test!"

Then suddenly Jed grabbed his comrade by the collar of his uniform, lifted him up and slammed him against the lockers and said "yes, I know! You idiot, I told you not to be seen by anyone! Now that scum-way is closer to being a pilot!"

"But, I did what you told too, boss! I hide where no one could see me, used the device and then hide it a safe place!" said his comrade.

"Well, you didn't do it good enough!" Jed continued to shout.

"I swear I put it in my locker where no one else could get to it!" his comrade said again.

Then Jed let go of his comrade and the other pilot slide to the floor.

"Someone must have come in here then, searched for it and found it. I don't know who it was, but when I do, I'll make that person will pay." Jed said.

"So now what do we do, boss?" said his comrade.

"Apparently, the serge entered him in the orbit guard fleet race for tomorrow; I'll make sure he never crosses the finish line." Jed said with on his fist raised up and tightly clenched.

00

The next day, Gordon dreaded going back to the orbit guard headquarters because he knew what lay ahead of him, but he knew he would be in even deeper trouble if he didn't go. The orbit guard fleet race was not for one the faint of heart, it was a race where the best orbit guard pilots competed against each other, and mostly it was for pilots to keep their skills sharp or to keep the pilots from getting bored when they weren't on missions or protect the headquarters from an enemy. There was no awards in the race expect the glory and praise of being the best pilot, young cadet pilots were free to enter, but generally they never won. What worried Gordon the most was he knew he going up against Jed, Jed had almost won every one the races and with him having an extreme resentment towards Gordon, he feared what Jed might try to do to him. But he had to do this if he wanted to be a pilot, if he got 4th place or better in the race, the serge would pass him as an official pilot, but if he didn't, it was back to his usual old duty.

Once Gordon got to the orbit guard headquarters, he immediately made his way to the runway where the other pilots were already getting ready for the race. The serge who was on the runway as well soon spotted Gordon and approached him.

"Well, Shumway, you actually showed up, didn't think you had it in you. Your ship is over there and good luck, you'll need it." The serge said with an evil chuckle.

"And put a suit on, you can at least look the part of a pilot." The serge said again as he walked away from Gordon.

Gordon quickly went to the pilot locker room and grabbed a spare pilot suit and helmet, the suit was kind of a tight fit on his body as it was made for more slender melmacians, but he managed to get it on. As he made his way back on the runway and towards his ship, he soon noticed Rick and Skip were on the runway now, probably to wish him good luck, but Gordon was taken by surprise as he soon noticed Rhonda was with them. He was in a panic now, he did not expect her to be here and he had no idea what to say to her.

Once all three on them approached Gordon, Rhonda was the first to speak "hey, Gordon."

"Uhhh…hi, Rhonda." Gordon said nervously

"I heard what you did yesterday; you passed the flight simulator test. First of all, congrats, but I never knew you really wanted to become a pilot." Rhonda said.

"Uhh…yeah, I wanted to tell you, but… I wanted to wait until I actually passed the test." Gordon said while trying to think up an excuse quickly.

"I wanted to be a…..surprise. Yeah, that's it." Gordon said again

Rhonda looked at him with a smile and said "while that is sweet of you, you could have told me anytime, I don't mind. Matter of fact, I think it is good your trying to become a pilot."

"Really?" Gordon said.

"Yeah, I think is kind of brave of you." Rhonda said.

"Gee, thanks." Gordon said blushing a little.

"So if you past the flight simulator test, why are you entering the race?" Rhonda said.

"The serge forced me into it, apparently that is the only way I'm going to get his approval of becoming a pilot." Gordon said.

"Oh, well good luck then" Rhonda said and then gave a quick kiss on the cheek. Gordon's hearted melted like butter at that moment.

Soon after, Rhonda walked away and left Gordon with just Rick and Skip.

"Whoa, well that went better than expected." Skip said.

"Yeah, I was for sure she was going to be mad at you." Rick said.

"Yeah, so did I, but she totally as the hots for me now." Gordon said with a smug smile on his face.

"I told you should you told her in the first place" ship said again.

"Hey, everything still worked out, didn't it?" Gordon said.

"Yeah, anyway, we just came here to wish you good luck." said skip again.

"Yeah, go luck, Gordon. Try to make it back in one piece." Rick said.

"Thanks guys, I'll keep that in mind." said Gordon.

After that, Rick and Skip walked off the runway and Gordon climbed into the cockpit of his orbit guard ship. As he did so, he noticed Jed started to climb up into the cockpit of his ship as well, but just before he climbed in, he eyed Gordon with murderous intent and pointed his finger at him. Gordon did not like that look in his eye, he felt something bad the definitely going to happen. Soon enough, the other pilots started the engines to this ships, Gordon soon did so as well. His ship was placed in the back in the starting lineup, as if things were not challenging enough for him, not only did have watch out for Jed, but had to get past all the other pilots too. Soon all of them eagerly waited for the green light for the race to start.

Meanwhile, inside Jed's ship, he spoke to his two comrades though his intercom who were in the two ships just behind him "remember, do not engage Gordon in the race, he is mine."

"Yes boss!" both of them said over their intercom to Jed's ship.

Meanwhile, inside the orbit guard headquarters, everyone was going to watch the race from the mess hall on the huge display screens. Just about everyone in the headquarters was going to watch this race, even the serge, fleet captain and admiral Logan. Cojack was there as well as he choose to opt out the race as he felt it was not fair to Gordon. The races course went over the grand melmacian city, through the tall mountains to the east and back again, going through the mountain range was the hardest part of the race as it was treacherous with so many twists and turns and less visibility with cloud cover. The race course was covered by satellite cameras placed all throughout the course to capture the race from every angle and transmit it back to the display screens at headquarters.

Soon enough, the starting lights on a small display screen on the runway appeared, first it flashed red, then yellow and then finally green, that was the signal that race at started. One by one the orbit guard ships started to take off from the runway. They flew up very high in the sky as so not to interfere with other air traffic that flew over Melmac. Gordon was in the very back of the line, if he wanted to past this test to become a pilot, we would have figure a way to pass all these other pilots, but for now he stayed put where he was. The orbit guard ships soon flew over the grand city of Melmac, it was the biggest city on Melmac. As Gordon's ship flew over, he briefly looked down from his cockpit window at the city. He was in awe on how big the city actually was as he had never seen the city from this high up. In the distance he could see the citadel tower that was at the center of the city, it was the tallest structure in the city and those that resided in that tower was the melmacian council, a group of elder melmacians that controlled all the affairs and laws all thought out melmac, at least that was what Gordon had been told. Gordon a never been in there or even seen it up close, and only a select few have ever been in that citadel. Gordon did wonder what it was like in there and what the elders looked like, but right now had to focus back on the race.

Eventually, the ships left the city and headed towards the mountains, Gordon wanted to make his move before they reached the mountains, so he increased the ships engine boosters to increase his speed, and he slowly weaved in and out among the other pilots to get in front of him. He had to be careful when maneuvering among the ships; one wrong move would send him colliding with another ship which would cause a chain reaction of the ships crashes into each other. Surprisingly none of the other pilots made a move to attack Gordon, not yet anyway, maybe they were waiting for right time to make their move, just like Gordon did.

Meanwhile, back at orbit guard headquarters were everyone was watching the race.

"Look! Gordon is making his move!" skip said.

"Please be careful, Gordon." Rhonda said to herself

"That's it, slow and steady" Cojack said to himself as he watched Gordon.

Back in the race, the ships were entering the mountain range and Gordon managed to maneuver his way up almost to where Jed was in front of the line, Gordon knew he would have extra careful if Jed was going to try anything. Gordon soon carefully inched is way up to be in line with Jed, he soon saw Gordon coming up behind him, but this time he gave off an evil smile, this is exactly what get wanted Gordon to do. Soon the ships came into a blind turn in the mountain range where the satellite camera could not see, Jed quickly sped up his ship and soon so did Gordon, he wanted to keep up pace with Jed. Soon they going so fast that they left the other ships far behind. Jed's two comrades soon took notice of this and sped up their ships too to catch up with them, but stayed far enough away to not be suspected for foul play. Soon Gordon was running neck and neck with Jed's ship. Suddenly Jed slammed his ship into the side of Gordon's, his ship jerked violently, but he managed to keep it stable, then Jed slammed into his ship again making the ship rock more violently, Gordon had to do something quick or he would be thrown out of the race. He tried to slow down a bit to let Jed pass him, but no, that was no good, Jed slowed his ship as well. Jed didn't care much about the race anymore; he was out for Gordon's blood. Gordon then tried to move behind Jed and then to the other side of Jed's ship where he thought he would less likely get hit, but no, that didn't work either, Jed slammed into him again, almost knocking off the course this time. Gordon's ship started to wobble from side to side as his ship's wings took on quite a bit of damage from Jed's repeated slamming, it become harder to Gordon to maintain control on his ship. Gordon's and Jed's soon came out the blind turn and were on course when the satellite camera could see them again.

Back at the headquarters, everyone who was watching the race soon took notice something was wrong with Gordon, everyone was more on the edge of their seats now.

"hey, what's going on with Gordo there?' skip said as he noticed how unsteady Gordon's flying was.

"oh no, is there something wrong with him?' rick said.

"I knew it! I knew that Gordon would crack under the pressure." said the serge who look noticed of Gordon as well.

"Don't underestimate him, he has not given up yet." said admiral Logan.

"Come on Gordon, keep it together." Cojack said to himself.

Back in the race, as Gordon continues to race alongside Jed, he soon took notice Jed was not attacking him anymore, at first Gordon was confused as to why, then suddenly it dawned on him. The satellite cameras were watching then now and Jed didn't want to get caught in the act.

"The sneaky bastard." Gordon said to himself.

Now Gordon knew if they went through another blind turn, he would surely try to knock him out the race again, he had to think of a way to prevent that from happening and quickly. Soon he got an idea, he moved his ship just underneath Jed's ship trying to keep up the same pace with him, now he could no longer be seen my Jed. Soon enough, they came to another blind turn around a mountain and sure enough Jed was ready to make his move, but when he did, he found out Gordon was nowhere to be seen.

"Alright, where are you? You lousy little furball." Jed said to himself.

"Boss, Gordon's right underneath you!" one of Jed's comrades said over his ship's intercom

"Thank you, boy. So you think you're clever, scum-way." Jed said.

Suddenly Jed quickly stirred his ship alongside Gordon's and slammed into his ship again. Gordon was taken by surprise Jed had found out where he was, then he remembered he had forgotten about Jed's two lackeys that were just behind him, they must have told him where he was. Gordon literally felt like between a rock and hard place now, no matter what move he made, Jed just counteracted it and he wasn't sure how long it could keep this up.

The ships soon neared the biggest and tallest mountain in the range, which was the turning point in the race and it had another blind spot in it. Once Gordon and Jed came around the back side of the where the blind stop was, Jed slammed into Gordon's ship again, this time pushing his ship closer to the rock face of the mountain, Gordon could do nothing but try to keep his ship stable and just made to the end of the race. Soon enough Jed pushed Gordon's ship so close to the rock face, his other wing started the scrape across the surface and started to tear it up into pieces. Gordon was in a panic now; he had no idea of what to do. Then Jed slammed into him again and that was the hit that did him in, Gordon lost control in the ship and his ship went in a nose dive.

"Eat my afterburners in the afterlife, scum-way!" Jed shouted as he saw Gordon go down. Jed then let out a loud evil laugh and then sped up his ship to fly on.

Gordon and Jed were just coming out the blind spot when it happened and the satellite cameras managed to capture Gordon going into a nose dive. Back at headquarters, everyone was on the edge of the seats with shock and horror.

"Oh no, that's Gordon's ship!" Rhonda shouted

"Pull up Gordon, before you crash!" Skip shouted at the display screen.

"I can't watch!" Rick said while covering his eyes with his hands.

"Christ! I knew he would crack, but didn't think he would crash too! Never should let that guy enter the race!" the serge said.

Even Cojack was showing great concern; this was not supposed to happen.

Back inside Gordon's ship, he was in utter panic now as his ship continued to spin out of control in a nose dive, his training with Cojack did not prepare him for this, but he had to maintain control over himself or he would become nothing more a bloody smudge on the rocky landscape. He engaged the wing stabilizer flaps, thankfully those were still working and pull hard back on the stirring controls. Soon enough, the ship stopped spinning, but he was still falling in a dive, he pulled harder on the controls to make the ship to go up, but it seemed no good. Gordon truly thought it was going to die now, he regretted he never told his family about becoming a pilot, he regretted his friends had to see him go down like this, especially Rhonda, he was sorry he would never get to tell her how really felt about her and was sorry that all the training Cojack had taught had gone in vain. No, he was going to give up just yet; he couldn't, for his family and friends and everyone else he cared about. He had to try one last thing, he set the wing thrushes to spin in the opposite direction so they would flow backwards, hopefully the backwards thrust would enough force to make the ship right itself, it was a long shot, but what choice did he have. Finally at the last minute before the ship would crash into a rocky ledge, the ship righted itself and Gordon was able to pull out of the dive.

Back at headquarters, everyone saw the whole thing and went into an uproar of cheering; Gordon had just done about the impossible.

"Gordon did it!" Rhonda, Skip and Rick all shouted at once.

"Impressive, even my most experienced pilots would have trouble with that one." said the fleet captain.

"When that Gordon gets back here, I'm going to skin him alive! How dare he almost cost me an orbit guard ship!" the serge said.

"Well done, Gordon." Cojack said to himself as he nodded his head.

Gordon stirred his ship back on the race course again, but by this time he was far behind from all the other ships, it would take a miracle for him to catch up. Then in the mountain he spotted an entrance to a tunnel that went straight though the mountain, it looked just big for a ship to pass through, Gordon soon got an idea and he went for it, he stirred his ship into the tunnel.

Back at headquarters, everyone saw the move Gordon made.

"Oh no, gordon's gone into that tunnel!" Rhonda said.

"That crazy fool! He is going to get himself killed again!" the serge said.

Back inside Gordon's ship, he was speeding through the tunnel, dodging large stalactites and stalagmites as he went. He hoped this tunnel would lead him to a short cut to the other side of the mountain and put him back in the race. At first he thought he made a bad mistake to come in here, but then he soon saw light up ahead and an exit out of the tunnel. The exit was narrow, but Gordon couldn't turn back now, so he turned his ship sideways hoping it would fit though.

Back at headquarters, everyone was eagerly watching the race to find out what happened to Gordon next. They saw the other ships coming around to the other side of the mountain, but not Gordon, everyone started to fear the worse. Suddenly, a ship burst though a narrow cave entrance just in front of all the other ships, it was Gordon, he had made it through! The other pilots were taken my complete surprise to find Gordon's ship appear right in front of them.

"Impossible!" Jed shouted from his ship.

Back at headquarters, again the crowed of melcanians watching the race burst out into uproar of cheering. The serge went wide eyed and his mouth hung open, he couldn't believe what he was hearing or seeing, everyone for was cheering for Gordon Shumway, supposedly the worse cadet in the orbit guard.

"Well, looks like that boy has been holding out on us." The fleet captain said.

"Indeed, I wonder where he learned those flight skills so quickly?" said admiral Logan.

Back in the race, Jed was boiling with rage now; he was for sure he had gotten rid of Gordon for good. Jed sped up his ship alongside Gordon's, he didn't have time to pull off his slamming move as there were no move blind spots through the race and they were leaving the mountain range, Jed just wanted to get in front of Gordon to make sure he didn't win. They were reaching the home stretch of the race, both Gordon and Jed were racing faster and faster towards the finish line, leaving the other ships far behind. They were neck and neck, neither one of them backing down. Finally the marker for the finish line was in sight, both Jed and Gordon raced even faster, this was going to be a really close race, soon they both crossed the finish line at the same time.

At the headquarters, everyone cheered again as they saw the two cross the finish line, but who had really won? No one could tell by the naked eye as the two ships were so close. Soon enough, both Jed and Gordon slowed down their ships and landed on the runway, eventually the rest of the pilots showed up and landed on the runway on well. Once all the ships had landed, everyone in the mess all rushed out on the runway to congratulate Gordon and to determine who had won the race. Once Gordon opened up the hatch to his ship, it was amazed everyone in the orbit guard crowed around his ship and cheering him on. As he climbed down from his ship, Rhonda, Skip and Rick were the first to greet him; Rhonda hugged him and so did rick and skip. Then Jed climbed down from his ship and once he saw the crowd cheering for Gordon, he growled furiously and threw his helmet to the ground. Then he forced he way through the crowd towards Gordon.

"Alright, scumball, how the hell did get out of that dive?!" Jed said as grabbed Gordon by his pilot uniform.

"What? Jealous I beat you ass?" Gordon said with a smile still on his face.

Then the crowd started to retaliate against Jed by shouting at him.

"Enough!" a voice spoke out from the crowd.

It was the admiral, with the serge and fleet captain right behind him, the crowd made way for all of them as they approached Gordon and Jed. Jed then let go of Gordon and stood up straight and spoke "sir!"

The admiral looked to Jed then to Gordon and soon spoke "since the race was such a close finish, we had to carefully go back and look at the footage and we found the Jed was an inch further ahead the Gordon. So by the rules of the race, Jed wins."

"HA! In your face, scum-way!" Jed shouted pointing at Gordon.

"BOOOOOOOO!" the crowd all shouted.

"Hey, you all supposed to be cheering for me!" Jed shouted at the crowd.

"That's enough, Jed." The admiral said.

The admiral then turned to Gordon and said "as for you, private Shumway, I heard you went into this race in order to pass the test to become a pilot, you shown impressive flight maneuvers and pilot strategies in the face of dire situations, so you pass."

The whole crowd cheering again and a wide smile spread of Gordon's face.

Jed growled angrily again and said "but sir, he fell into a nose dive and look at the damage he did to the ship!"

"But he did figure out how to get of the situation quickly, just as a pilot should." The admiral said.

Then Gordon remembered no one saw what Jed did in the race and he was going to get away with it, Gordon would have to say something now if he wanted to expose Jed for the rat that he is, so he spoke up "sir, may I please speak."

"Yes, Gordon, what is it?" he admiral said.

"The reason I went into the dive is because of Jed, he kept slamming into me, he wanted me knock out the race for good." Gordon said.

After that, the whole crowd gasped, but the admiral just gave him a cocked eyebrow.

"This is absurd! I did nothing or the sort!" Jed said.

"Please sir, look at the damage to my ship, you can see for yourself." Gordon said to the admiral.

Before could say anything more and evil grin spread on Jed's face and he spoke again "sir, may I please speak, I got something to say as well. "

"Fine Jed, go ahead." The admiral said.

"Another thing you didn't know was that Gordon has been secretly training with orbit guard pilot Cojack to become a pilot!" Jed said.

With that, the whole crowd gasped again, this time the admiral, the serge and the fleet captain all went wide with surprise.

Then the fleet captain turned towards Cojack in the crowd and said "is it true?"

Cojack just down casted his head a little and said "yes sir."

"You see! That against orbit guard rules, he shouldn't be able to pass the test!" Jed shouted again.

Gordon wanted to curl up and die right now, how in the world did Jed find out about that? Now everyone in the orbit guard found out about it.

"All three of you, to the admiral's office NOW!" the serge shouted.

So then Cojack, Jed and Gordon were all escorted to the admiral's office to get this whole mess straightened out and to find out the whole truth. All three of were being integrated separately so they could each tell their own story truthfully without being interrupted by each other. They all sat in chairs just outside the admiral's office while being watched over by other orbit guardsmen. First Cojack went in, then Jed and then finally it was Gordon's turn. He stood in the middle of the room facing Admiral Logan who was sitting at his desk and sergeant staff was standing up right beside him.

The admiral leaned in with his elbows on his desk and looked at Gordon with stern expression and finally said "Gordon Shumway, do you swear to tell the truth and nothing but the truth?"

"Yes sir." Gordon just simply said.

"Very well, did or did not orbit guard pilot Cojack have secret training sessions with you to pass the flight tests?"

"Yes sir, he did." Gordon said, he figured there no point in hiding it now.

"And that you accused orbit guard pilot Jed for damaging your ship and caused to go the nose dive in the race?" the admiral said.

"Yes sir." Gordom simply said again.

"Also the EMP transmitter device you presented to sergeant staff yesterday, you accuse of Jed using that device while you taking the flight simulator test?" The admiral said.

"Yes sir." Gordon said.

"Even though Cojack was the one who found the device and brought the information to your attention?' the admiral said.

"Yes sir." Gordon said as he down casted his head a little.

"so you admit to have training sessions without supervision from an orbit guard official and accusing an orbit guard pilot of serious offenses without proper evidence to support you claim?" the admiral said.

"Yes sir." Gordon said soberly.

"That in itself is a serious offense that can get you discharged from the orbit guard, but we are willing to negotiate with you. Cojack said he only trained on the flight simulator test and nothing else, it that true?" the admiral said.

"Yes sir, he just trained me with that, everything else I learned on my own" gordon said.

"I see, Cojack also said he wanted you to present the sergeant with EMP device so you could clear your name, is that true as well? " The admiral said.

"Yes sir." Gordon said.

"I see, well your story does match of with Cojack's. However, your story does not match up on what Jed told us, he said he never did those things you say he did." The admiral said.

Gordon figured as much Jed would lie even to the face of the admiral just to save his own ass, Gordon had to speak up now or Jed would get away with everything.

"Sir, may I please speak?" gordon said.

"Very well." the admiral said.

"Sir, can't you see he is lying to you? He is using my own words against me just to save his own ass. He deliberately only attacked in the blind spots in the race and used one of his comrades to use the device just so you would not catch him in the act. Please just look more closely to the damage on the ship and the device and you can see I'm telling the truth." Gordon said.

"As it stands right now, it's your word against Jed's and as he has been with us longing then you have and you have a record of disobeying orders and slacking on your duties. So we have no choice but to be in favor of Jed's story." The admiral said.

Gordon was getting a bit frustrated now, the evidence was right in front of them and yet they refused to see it.

"alright fine, don't believe me, if you take Jed's word over mine just because he is a top ranking pilot and if that what it takes to a pilot around here, then I'm outta here!" Gordon shouted and then took his orbit guard badge out and threw it down on the admiral's desk and walked out of the office.

"Private Shumway, get back here! How dare to talk to the admiral that way!" the serge shouted as he watched Gordon walk out the door.

"Peace sergeant, let him go." The admiral just simply said.

Gordon couldn't believe himself what he just done, talking back to the admiral was unheard by anyone in the orbit guard, but the way things were going he figured he was going to get kick out anyway, so it was best he speak his mind and let himself out.

By the time the integration was over, it was late in the day and most of the other orbit guard personal had gone home for the day. Rhonda, Skip and Rick stayed behind to find out what was going to happen to Gordon, they were sitting on a bench in the courtyard in front of the orbit guard building. Soon enough, Gordon was walking out the front entrance to the building and saw his friends all waiting for him.

"Hey, Gordo, so how did it go?" skip said.

"Was the admiral mad at you or what?" rick said.

"The admiral didn't can you, did he?" Rhonda said.

Gordon just looked at them soberly and said "well, not exactly."

"Then what happened?" skip said.

"I walked out on them." Gordon said.

"You WHAT?!" all three of them shouted at once.

"Gordon, you know walking out on the admiral with certainly get you kicked out of the orbit guard." Rhonda said.

"Yeah, I know, but they were going in favor of jed's story, so I was going to get kicked out anyway, best go out with a bang I suppose." Gordon said.

"Oh Gordon, I'm so sorry." Rhonda said.

"Ah, it's okay, I figured by days were numbered round here anyway." Gordon said.

"We're going to miss you around here." Skip said.

"Yeah, you always kept things interesting." Rick said.

"Hey guys, I'll still be around, just not here and really I'm kind of glad, I don't have to be under that titrant sergeant staff's rules anymore." Gordon said.

After that, Gordon decided to sit down and wait with his friends for the official word from the admiral. A few minutes later, the admiral and the sergeant came out of the front entrance and walked towards Gordon. Gordon saw them coming, let out a heavy sigh and stood up to face the music.

Once Gordon stood in front the admiral and sergeant, the admiral soon spoke. "after some debate, we decided to take you up on what you said and investigated the evidence further, the damage to your ship was caused by another ship colliding with it and as for the EMP transmitter device, we did run it though analysis and found fingerprints on it which belonged to one the orbit guard pilots that is associated with Jed, no doubt he would get one of them to his dirty work for him. So Jed and other two pilots are found guilty. Turns out you right after all."

Instantly a smile spread across Gordon's face, but then he remembered Cojack.

"What about Cojack? He's not in trouble is he?" Gordon said.

"No, since his training with you were for good intentions, he won't get discharged, but we advised him not do to anymore training with you unless me or sergeant authorizes it." the admiral said.

"Phew, that a relief." Gordon said.

"Now there is still the matter of you passing the test to become a pilot, even though Cojack trained you, you showed exceptional skills that you preformed on your own during the race which made it clear for you the past the test." The admiral said.

"But I talked back you and walked out on you." Gordon said soberly down casting his head.

"But you were not afraid to tell the truth and speak you mind when you had too and that is just the kind of melmacians we need in the orbit guard fleet." The admiral said.

Gordon perked he head back up once the admiral said that.

"Congratulations Gordon Shumway, I now authorize you as an official orbit guard pilot." The admiral said as brought out his hand to offer a handshake.

Gordon immediately shook his hand said "really?! Thank you very much sir!"

After they finished shaking hands, the admiral spoke again "tomorrow you will report to the fleet captain, he will brief you on your duties."

"Yes sir, understood." Gordon said and then saluted.

And then the admiral turned around and started to walk away, but the serge stayed behind and said "just because you're a pilot now doesn't mean I won't still keep my eye on you any less."

Then the serge soon walked away from Gordon, he just shrugged his shoulders and continued to smile, not even the serge's remarks could dampen his spirits now.

Rhonda immediately ran over to him and hugged him while rick and skip patted him on the back.

"Oh Gordon, that is wonderful news to hear!" Rhonda said.

"Yeah, it's funny how everything worked out like that." Gordon said.

"I guess you wouldn't want to hang around us lower ranking members anymore." Skip said sarcastically.

"Nonsense, I'll never forget my old pals." Gordon said back.

After that, they all laughed about it. Then Gordon spotted several orbit guardsman escorting Jed and his two lackeys out of orbit guard headquarters, as they passed Gordon and the others, Jed turned his head and said "I'll get you for this Gordon, I swear it."

Then one the orbit guardsman shoved Jed to move on and he continued to walk on. Gordon was a bit worried on Jed's words, but since he was a pilot now he had a better chance of being protected from Jed, so he just shrugged it off.

They all decided to celebrate Gordon's hard won victory in becoming a pilot by going to favorite diner for dinner and drinks. Of course, he arrived home very late and his parents wanted to know why, so he decided to tell them the truth, about the training, the flight simulator test, the race and everything else. Surprisingly, his parents were not made at him, matter of fact they were proud of him, proud that he actually worked hard to make something of himself.

00

Meanwhile, while all this was going on, out in space several mysterious looking vessels entered Melmac's orbit and headed for the northern polar regions of the planet, not a single one of them was detected by the orbit guard.


	4. Ch 4: visions of the future

ALF: under red skies

Chapter 4: Visions of the future

The next day, when Gordon went to the orbit guard headquarters, he reported in to the fleet captain and the captain gave him his updated uniform and badge to say he was officially a pilot. Then the captain assigned him the first shift of flight patrol, Gordon did not put up any protest. Flight patrol was when single pilots go out as a scout looking for any suspicious activity in the sky, if the pilot found anything he would report back to headquarters and from there the fleet captain would decide if it was anything worth engaging in aerial assault.

After Gordon stopped by in the hanger bay to say hi to his friends Rick and Skip first, he proceeded to the runway where his ship was ready and waiting for him. He started up the ship which seemed natural to him by now and took off from the runway. He was instructed by the fleet captain to circle around the outskirts of the grand city where Larson petty as be known to launch an attack. For the first few minutes he was happy and excited because for the first time flying he didn't have to worry about being shot down or killed by an enemy or a hot head for a pilot, for now he just enjoyed the view, clear blue skies with very few clouds above him, the landscapes of the city and suburbs of Melmac below him. For hours he scanned the skies for anything suspicious, but he found nothing expect for the usual passenger space ships that flew over Melmac, there was not even so much a bird up here. As time passed, Gordon started to get a bit bored, thankfully his shift only lasted a few hours in the morning and would be back to the headquarters just in time of lunch, another pilot would take over his shift from there.

After he landed his ship, he immediately went to the mess hall to find Rick and Skip already sitting at a table. Gordon quickly grabbed some food and sat down next to them, they were eager to know how his flight experience went.

"So Gordon, how did first flight go?" rick said.

"Not bad, a bit dull though." Gordon said while eating his food.

"Be thankful for that, I'm surprised you didn't run into any of Larson's ships." Skip said.

"Yeah, maybe that nut job for a Melmacian finally give up." Gordon said as a joke but truthfully he dreaded the thought of having to engage with any of Larson's ships ever again.

Suddenly Rhonda appeared and sat down next to Gordon, which was surprising because she never did it before. Gordon was still a bit nervous and shy around her. Rhonda asked how his first flight went too and Gordon gave her the same answer as he did Rick and Skip. After that, they just chatted among themselves about the usual stuff.

Then Gordon saw sergeant staff walk past him, the serge give him an angry look as he walked passed and then just moved on. Gordon breathed a sigh of relief, for the first time in his life he didn't have to take the wrath from the serge, now he was a pilot he was no longer under his authority, the only authority he took now was from either the fleet captain or the Admiral.

Then Cojack appeared in the mess hall and approached Gordon and said to him "Gordon, after lunch break I want you to meet me in the obstacle course training area, I need to talk to you."

Gordon just shrugged his shoulders and said "okay."

Then Cojack turned and left the mess hall.

"What was that all about?" skip said.

"Don't know, just hope it's not something bad." Gordon said.

"You still trust that guy, Gordo?" skip said.

"Hey, he did help me become a pilot, how bad could he possibly be?" Gordon said.

"I don't know, he still seems pretty shady to me." Skip said.

"You worry too much. Him and me are pretty tight right now." Gordon said.

After lunch, Gordon did as he was told and went to the obstacle training course area which was a few yards away behind the orbit guard headquarters. Really he dreaded going back to that area, when his first joined the orbit guard he had to go through that obstacle course many times just in order to make to the lowest rank in the orbit guard. He had bad memories of the serge shouting at him while he ran, climbed and crawled through the obstacles in the course. How he got through all that was nothing short of a miracle.

Gordon soon found Cojack waiting for him at the edge of the course; he approached him and soon said "what's up Cojack? I thought we were done training."

"As a pilot yes, but were here to start training you on other things, one which is hand to hand combat." Cojack said.

"But I'm a pilot, right? I don't need to learn those things." Gordon said.

"You may be a pilot, but you still need to know the basics on how to defend yourself when not in a ship. Would you know what to do if your ship crashed landed and you were surrounded by enemies on the ground?" Cojack said.

"Well, no" Gordon simply said.

"Exactly my point." Cojack said.

Gordon then down casted his head and sat down on a bench beside him and soon said "I appreciate what you're doing, Cojack, but I'm not a fighter, I'm just an average guy. I could barely make through the obstacle course and already failed the hand to hand combat training when the serge made me do it."

Then Cojack leaned down to one knee to be eye level with Gordon said "I'm well aware you are not as strong and agile as the others. That is why the Admiral assigned me to do your training instead of the sergeant, we can work at a pace your more comfortable with and not push you too hard like the serge did."

"Thanks for that, but it still wouldn't do any good." Gordon said soberly.

"Why? It is because you think you're not good enough to be a fighter?" Cojack asked.

Gordon simply nodded his head.

Then Cojack said "I see, there is that self-doubt again. Look at what you have accomplished so far, you wanted to be a pilot and now you are one. Like I said before, you never what your capable of until you put your mind to it."

Gordon's mood did lighten up a bit at what Cojack had said, he was right; he did fight hard to earn his place as a pilot and he was not about to give it up. After thinking it over a bit more, Gordon finally looked up at Cojack said "okay, I'll do it."

"That's better. Okay, we'll start with some basic hand movements." Cojack said.

So, Gordon and Cojack started the training session by doing basic hand movements, slowly steady movements just to the rhythm down to punch or grab someone or block an attack, it was kind of similar to karate. It was nothing to strenuous and Gordon didn't have to hit anything, that part would be saved form another time. Soon enough it was getting late in the day and Cojack soon stopped and said "that's enough training for today, we'll start again tomorrow after your fight patrol shift."

"Okay, Later Cojack." Gordon said.

Soon the two parted ways, Gordon immediately went to the pilot locker room to get his things, caught up with his friends Rick and Skip to chat with them for a bit and soon they all went home for the day.

The next several days went into this routine of him doing his morning flight patrol shift, having lunch with his friends and doing a training session with Cojack afterwards. Soon enough he started to get bored on his patrol shift duty because nothing ever happened which was very odd because Larson petty had not made an attack in several days, usually Larson attempted a new attack every few days, but now everything was strangely quiet. Really Gordon was thankful nothing did happen of his shift because he dread the thought of meeting Larson petty again, but at the same time he wished something exciting would happen.

One night when Gordon was home asleep, he had a very strange dream. First, his vision with filled with a scene of him walking down a street in a malmacian city, but it was devastated. Most of the buildings were severally damaged, crumbled to pieces or on the verge of collapse. Tons of hover cars lay sprawled out on the street he was on, like someone had tossed them around like kids toys, along with tons of other kinds of debris scattered on the street. Everything was eerily silent, not so much as single melmacian or even a bird could be seen or heard, it was like a ghost town. What the hell happened here? Where is everyone? Gordon thought to himself. To him this did not seem like a dream, it felt strangely real to him. As he continued to walk down the street, he soon found his answer to what happened to everyone, he soon came across dozens of melmacian bodies scattered on the street, and they were all dead. As he looked at the bodies more closely, he saw they all had been either shot, stabbed or killed in a gruesome manner. Gordon was horrified, he quickly turned away from the bodies, leaned down and put a hand over his mouth, and he was the verge of vomiting.

Suddenly the scene changed again, it quickly shifted to a barren landscape. Gordon stood up again and looked around, the scene that lay out before was just a grim as the last. Not a bit of vegetation could be seen for hundreds of miles, not a speck of grass and all the trees had either fallen or were stripped bare. His feet stood soaking in thick mud. Then he looked up into the sky, it was a sickly charcoal grey color, not a single ray of sunlight shine through the thick clouds. Then Gordon quickly turned around as he heard a noise, at first it sounded like thunder, but as the noise got louder it sounded more like the rumbling of hundreds of feet running across the ground. Soon enough he saw it, a massive army of melmacians was running towards him, as they got closer to him, he could see they were orbit guard by the combat armor they were wearing the weapons they were carrying. Then he quickly turned around the other way and saw another massive army of melmacians running towards from the opposite direction, Gordon soon recognized them as Lasron Petty's army by the battle armor and weapons they were carrying. Soon he realized he was right in the heart of a battlefield, he yelled at the armies to stop, but none of them seemed to hear him. Gordon quickly crouched low to the ground and covered his head with his hands, as the two melmacian armies clashed into each other. He could hear gunfire, explosions, metal clinging against metal and melmacians screaming while dying in agony all around him. There was nothing he could do about it but hunker down and bare it and hoped he would not get killed, but really the battling armies seemed to be obvious he was even there. Suddenly both the malmacian armies stopped fighting each other and looked up towards the sky, Gordon soon noticed the fighting had stopped and got up to look at the sky as well. What he saw just about made his face fall off, a massive spaceship was slowly emerging from the thick clouds, and it was bigger than any melmacian ship he had ever seen. Once the ship fully emerged from the clouds, it silently hovered over the battlefield area; the only sound that could be heard was a low deep hum emitting from the ship. Soon a circular doorway in the middle of the underside of the ship started to open up and reveal a massive compartment inside the ship, something started to descend from the massive compartment, but Gordon could not make out what it was. Then his vision suddenly filled with blinding blue and white light.

What happened next, Gordon did not know as the scene quickly changed again, now he was deep out in space looking down on his home planet, Melmac. How in the world was he floating in space still alive without a spacesuit on? Gordon did not know, but those thoughts were obvious to him as his attention was on Melmac. He saw his planet started to turn a sickly reddish brown color, like all life was quickly being drained from it. Then he saw the planet's surface start to crack and break apart, and then suddenly the planet exploded in a massive fiery explosion. The planet was reduced to millions of tiny chucks of earth scattering throughout space.

From there the dream ended, Gordon abruptly woke up screaming, then he quickly looked around panting heavily soon realizing that what happened was all a dream and he was back in his bedroom. He was drench in a cold sweat and was shaking a bit from the dream. He continued to sit up in his bed and rubbed his hands on his forehand while thinking about the dream. He knew now that it was a dream, but it seemed so real to him, the devastated city, the dead bodies, the battlefield and that strange massive spaceship and then his planet exploding. What did it all mean? Why did he have a dream like this now? And why was it of Melmac's apocalyptic doom? Gordon knew he would probably never get the answers to those questions, at least not on his own.

A few minutes later, his bedroom door opened, it was his mom "Gordon, you okay? I heard you scream."

Gordon turned to his mom and said "I'm fine, mom. Just had a…nightmare."

"You see, what did I tell you about eating cat pies before bed?" his mom said.

"It's okay, mom. I won't do it anymore." Gordon said.

"Okay, try to go back to sleep. Goodnight, Gordon." His mom said as he closed the door.

"Goodnight." Gordon said before his mom fully closed the door.

So Gordon tried to go back to sleep, but he couldn't fearing that the dream might come back again. Furthermore, his thoughts still raced through his head on the dream. Throughout the night he really didn't get that much sleep.

In the morning, he was very drowsy from the lack of sleep, but had to report to his orbit guard duty anyway. He tried his best to stay awake on his morning flight patrol shift, but it was hard as nothing ever happened during his shift. By the time it got to his lunch break, he felt terrible. When he finally sat down with Rick and Skip, they looked at him with some concern.

"Wow, you look awful." Skip said.

"Believe me, I feel awful. I had a bad night's sleep." Gordon said.

"Why? What happened, Gordon?" Rick said.

"Just a bad stomach ache, must of been something I ate, but I'm okay now." Gordon said.

Gordon choose not to tell them about his dream, they would just think he is crazy anyway. Besides, dreams didn't mean much of anything anyway.

Soon enough it was time for his training session with Cojack, he still was extremely tired and didn't feel like doing it, but he had too. When he meant up with Cojack, he too noticed Gordon's drowsiness and showed some great concern as well.

"Gordon, are you okay?" Cojack said.

"Yeah, I'm fine, just had a bad night's sleep last night." Gordon said.

"Are you sure you're up for training today?"Cojack said.

"Yeah, I'll be fine." Gordon said.

"Okay, as you wish, but if you want to stop at any time, don't be afraid to say so." Cojack said,

So Gordon and Cojack started training, this time Cojack taught how to do basic punches and kicks and block attack, but Gordon had a hard time concentrating. He was constantly missing his targets he used as practice and he was stumbling a lot. Cojack soon took notice of this and after a while he finally said "that's it Gordon. We'll stop training for today, you're obviously too tired to focus properly. We'll continue training another time when you feel better."

"No, let's continue, I can handle it." Gordon said.

"No, you can't, don't push yourself, you'll end up making yourself sick. Go home, we'll continue this tomorrow." Cojack said.

Gordon finally gave in and said "okay"

So the two melmacians parts ways again and Gordon figured it was best to go home early, there was not much he could here anymore. So he grabbed his things from his pilot locker and went home for the day. When he got home, he decided to take a quick nap, thankfully the dream did not return when he fell asleep this time. But he was no so lucky that night, the dream had happened again, it was the same thing, it happened the same way and it ended at the same moment. Gordon woke up again, not screaming this time, but still drenched in a cold sweat and panting heavily. Why was this happening to him? Why did this dream continue to haunt him? But even with the second time of this dream happening, he choose to ignore it. A few more nights had passed, and the dream still happened. Eventually, his lack of sleep started to take its toll on him, he could barely stay awake during his work day at the orbit guard headquarters and everyone was starting to get greatly concerned for him, even his family started to worry about him.

Soon enough, one day when Gordon was about to head out for his morning fight patrol shift, the fleet captain approached him and said "hold up, Gordon. I need to talk to you."

"Yes sir?" Gordon said back.

"I have noticed you're increasingly drowsy when you come in for orbit guard duty and that can be dangerous, so I'm giving you the day off." The captain said.

"No, please sir, I can handle it." Gordon said.

"Sorry, I can't have pilots sleeping on the job." The captain said.

"But I won't fall asleep, I promise." Gordon said.

"No, sorry, you're too much of a risk. Go home, get a good day's rest" The captain said.

"But I can really handle it; I'm just having….personal issues." Gordon said.

"Well, whatever they are, get them straighten out, before I have to put you on liberal leave without pay. Now go home, that's an order." The captain said.

Gordon finally gave in and said "yes sir."

So Gordon gathered his things and left, but he didn't feel like going home right away. He just sat in a court yard area that was behind the orbit guard building and near the obstacle training course. He had to think of a way to get rid of this dream, it was ruining his life, but he had no idea of how to get rid of it. More questions became to run though his mind about the dream, but he knew never find the answers to them. Despite all this, he still didn't want to anyone about his dream, they would all think he was crazy or just laugh at him. He didn't even want to tell his family about it because they would probably think he is slowly losing his mind and might send him to psyche ward. He soon became frustrated and buried his face in his hands.

Then he heard a voice say "are you okay?"

Gordon perked his head back up only find out it was Cojack who spoke.

"Oh, hey Cojack." Gordon said in a somber tone.

"I heard that the fleet captain give you the day off because you looked really tired. Is there something going on?" Cojack said.

"Uhhh….it's nothing." Gordon said as he turned away from Cojack.

Cojack then sat down next to Gordon and said in comforting voice "it's obvious that there is something wrong. You know you can tell me anything and I will keep it a secret."

Gordon then turned towards Cojack and said "well, okay, but promise you won't think I'm crazy."

"Of course not." Cojack said.

"Well, you see I have been having this dream, the really strange and traumatizing one, first I'm walking through a devastated city, everything his destroyed and there are….. dead melmacians bodies everywhere. Then I'm in the middle of battlefield where two melmacian armies are killing each other, then a huge strange spaceship appears out of the sky and then a bright blue while light starts to come from it." Gordon starts to shake a bit as he continues to explain the dream.

"Then I'm out in space, looking down on melmac….and….the planet…..it explodes….there is….nothing left of it." Gordon says finished explain the dream and continues a shake.

"Mmm…that is a real interesting dream. And how long have you been having this dream?" Cojack said.

"Almost every night now." Gordon said.

"And you have told no one about this? Not even that Admiral?" Cojack said.

"No, they would just think I'm crazy." Gordon said.

"Well, if you had been having this dream several times, then obviously it has to mean something, something important." Cojack said.

"Cojack, I don't know what to do! The dream keeps haunting me and I have no idea what it means! And I have no one to turn too!" Gordon started to shout in a panic.

"Whoa, calm down, kid! Don't worry, we'll figure this out somehow." Cojack said putting his hand on Gordon's shoulder to try to calm down.

"I'll try to talk to the admiral about this, he won't think of it as crazy if it is coming from me." Cojack.

"You do that for me? Gee, thanks Cojack." Gordon said.

"No problem at all. Best you go home and try to get some rest."Cojack said.

After that, the two parted ways again, Gordon decided to go home and try to take a long nap. But of course, as he finally fell asleep, the dream happened again, but this time it was a little different, towards the end when melmac was about to explode, a face of a melmacian appeared. Gordon did not recognize who this melmacian was at all, but his face looked a lot like Gordon's, only a lot older. He had the same thick bushy black eyebrows and same black eyes that a shine to them, he stare was both stern and yet somehow comforting. Then Gordon soon took notice he was wearing a sort of helm or crown in his head, two strips of metal that ran down the sides of his head and looped back around the ears and above his forehead on the helm was three spikes sticking up with three ruby gems in them. Then Gordon heard a voice in his head that said…

_Tell them._

Gordon abruptly woke up again from the dream, this time he was even more confused. Who the hell was that he had just saw in his dream? He remembered the voice in his head saying "Tell them." Tell what and who? Now Gordon was more confused than ever was before, who was this malmaciam trying to tell him something in his dreams? Then he thought back to what Cojack had said, maybe this dream did mean something. Why else why would he have this dream over and over again and now the stranger melmacian talking to him in his sleep? As Gordon started to think more on the dream, the more it started to make sense. Then it dawned on him, maybe this was a warning of some kind and he was ignoring it this whole time. Maybe the visions in his dream were of things to come in the future.

But Gordon thought again "no, that's crazy! How could possibly have a dream of what might happen in the future?"

But as he thought about it again, what other explanation could there be? He never had dream this dramatic before. Then he thought back to the voice his head that said "Tell them", he was still confused on who to tell. Was it to tell someone about this dream? He didn't see that doing much good because anyone he would tell would think he is crazy. Then again, he did tell Cojack about it and he seemed to not freak out about it, but he wondered of what Cojack really thought of him. He just hoped the Cojack would tell the Admiral and that he too would believe him. Gordon decided if the Admiral did ask about the dream, he would tell he everything straight out, he could not hide the dream any longer.

Gordon decided to get up as it was no use trying to go back to sleep after having the dream. It was late afternoon now, Gordon figure his friends Rick and Skip would getting off orbit guard duty soon, so he figured he would meet up with at the cat diner to help calm his mind down.

When Rick and Skip finally made it to the diner, Gordon was already sitting at the bar having a drink, they both soon sat down next to Gordon.

"Yo Gordo, how come we didn't see you at work today?" Skip said.

"The fleet captain gave me the day off." Gordon said.

"Wow, I wish the serge was that nice to us." Skip said again.

"Was it because you been sleeping on the job?" rick said.

Gordon simply nodded his head.

"You been like that for a few days now, Gordon. What's up?" Skip asked.

Despite what the dream had told him, he still could not bring himself to tell his friends about the dream, it might be a little too much for them to take in. Also he wanted to insure the Admiral knew first beforehand to make sure he was not going crazy.

"It's just some personal issues I need to work out. Don't worry guys, hopefully this will be over soon." Gordon said.

"But were your best friends, you know you tell us just about anything." Rick said.

"I know, but I can handle this on my own." Gordon said.

Both Rick and Skip just shrugged their shoulders and say nothing more of it. The rest of the evening, they ordered food and drinks and talked about other things. Soon enough it was getting late and Gordon and his two friends decided to go home for the night. When Gordon went to sleep that night, the dream did not return and thank Barry for that as he was finally able to get a good full night's sleep.

The next day, Gordon was feeling a lot better after a good night's sleep, when he went to the orbit guard headquarters he was in a much happier mood and hoped the fleet captain would not give another day off, not that he liked having a day off, but his day was just boring without Rick, Skip and Rhonda around. Just when he was about to leave to do his morning patrol flight shift again in the pilot locker room, the fleet captain approached him again, Gordon got a bit nervous, what did he want him for this time?

"Gordon hold up, I hope you are in much better condition today." the captain said.

"Uhh…yes sir." Gordon said.

"That's good to hear. Anyway, Admiral Logan wants to see you." The captain said.

Gordon's heart sank a little once he heard those words and he soon said "really? Ummm….did he say what for?"

"No, but you better meet up with him, he does not like to wait long." The captain said.

After that, Gordon immediately walked out the pilot locker room to find the Admiral waiting for him just outside.

"You wanted to see me, sir?" Gordon said nervously.

"Yes, as I have something I need to discuss with you. Follow me." Admiral Logan said.

Gordon did as he was told and walked along with the Admiral, the started to walk down the hallway where the office room for the Admiral, Captain and Sargent were. He got a few looks from other orbit guard personal as they walked by, but Gordon did his best to ignore them. Soon they both went into a private room, the room was small with no windows, only one door, one table and two chairs and unknown to Gordon, there was a hidden camera mounted high in one of the corners of the room. Admiral Logan sat down in one the chairs next to the table and Gordon sat down in the chair across from him.

Once Gordon sat down, the Admiral soon spoke "now, Cadet Shumway, I have heard that you been having this dream for the past few days and that it has affected you so much that it has decreased your performance on your pilot duties, is that correct? "

"Umm…yes sir, but I'll make sure it doesn't happen again." Gordon said still nervous as hell.

"Good to hear of it, but that's not why you're here." Admiral Logan said.

"Sir?" Gordon simply said back.

"I want to know more about this dream you been having. Please tell me exactly everything you remember from the dream." Admiral Logan said.

Gordon gulped a bit and tried to collect his thought on the dream "well….okay, I'll try my best. First I'm walking through a street in a melmacian city, buildings are destroyed, destroyed hover cars are scattered everywhere and then…. I see….dead bodies….everywhere. Then the dream quickly shifts to a battlefield of two melmacian armies killing each other, I think one of them was orbit guard, the other was Larson petty's army. Then I see a huge strange ship emerge out of the clouds over the battlefield and then I see a bright blue white light come from underside of the ship. And then…."

Gordon started to shake a bit, finding it hard to tell the dream any further.

Then Admiral Logan puts his hand on Gordon's hand resting on the table and said "please, I know this must be hard for you, but you must tell me the rest."

Gordon finally spoke again "and then I'm out in space….looking down on Melmac….I see it slowly start to break apart….and then…..it explodes."

After Gordon finished telling the dream, the Admiral just stares at him with not even so much a twitch of an eyebrow. Gordon starts to get the feeling the Admiral did not believe him.

"Is that all of it?' Admiral Logan said.

"Yes sir, I woke up after that point." Gordon said.

He decided to leave out the part where his saw the older melmacian that looked just like him, he decided to keep that part a deep secret for now.

"So that's it, now you think I'm crazy don't you?" Gordon said.

"Of course not, but it is really interesting you would a dream such as this. Can you tell me when this dream started?" the admiral said.

"Yes sir, a few days ago, really shortly after I became a pilot." Gordon said.

"Mmm….that makes it even more interesting." The Admiral said a rubbed his chin with his fingers.

"So can you tell what causing to have this dream?" Gordon said.

"I have a theory, but it's only a theory. Now what about to tell you must be kept an absolute secret, understand?" the admiral said.

"Ummm…yes sir." Gordon said.

"Very well, it is a possibility that you were dream jumped." the Admiral said.

"Dream jumped? What's that?" Gordon said.

"It's when someone else can literally jump inside you mind and see your thoughts and dreams and it's even possible that someone else can imprint their own memories into your mind. It is technique the orbit guard has been working on for years, but have not quite perfected it yet." The Admiral explained.

Gordon's eyes went wide on what the Admiral had said and soon spoke out "you mean someone else got inside my head and put that dream there?!"

"It can't be ruled out as a possibility, it would explain why you been having this dream several nights in a row." The admiral said.

"Do…do you think it is from….the future?" Gordon said nervously.

"That is too soon to know for certain, but what I want to know is who dream jumped you and why. Are you certain you don't remember anything else from the dream?" the Admiral said.

"Umm…no sir" Gordon simply said back.

"Very well, with that this ends our discussion, but if you have that dream again or if the dream changes, don't be afraid to come to me right away, understand?" The Admiral said.

"Yes sir." Gordon said back.

"You're free to go then." the Admiral said.

After that, Gordon got up out of his seat and Admiral Logan soon followed him and they both left the room. As Gordon continued down the hallway back the pilot locker room, the fleet captain soon appeared behind the Admiral and spoke out "so what do you think, as that kid has gone crazy or there is some truth to what he said?"

The Admiral turns towards the fleet captain and said "only time will tell, but we just pray that it does not come true."

While Gordon was on his morning patrol flight shift, all he thought about was that melmacian he saw in his dream and that dream jumping theory. The more he thought about it, the more it became clear, it was certain now that someone was trying to contact him to give a warning. He had to find who that melmacian was and why he put that dream in his head, maybe then he could tell the Admiral about this strange malmacian and everything would be a whole lot more clearer.


End file.
